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Youth: and other Poems 











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?outb: a Poem of Soul 
and Sense, ana other 

Poems * * * * * * 



By 

micfiael ttlonatom 



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Ok Jflbatty PublisDind Company 



MDCCCXC V 
3*1 vy 






Copyright 

by 

Michael Monahan 

MDCCCXCV 



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the true ana the €ba$tc 






101 
112 



Contents 

The Pro -Word Page ix 

YOUTH : 
A POEM OF SOUL AND SENSE i 7 - 99 

Urbs Ir^e 

A Belated Singer 

EUTHANASY jjg 

The Time of Louis the Grand I24 

Marian: or, the Corset I2 j 

After "Aux Italiens " I% ~ 

Margie 

Catherine of Russia I42 

Jesus of Mexico I47 

A Stage Picture It .e 

TO MY WIFE 

Dedication I( .g 

Wilt Thou Forget with Adding Years 163 

The Quarrel i6s 

The Awakening i7<j 



Child Care and Heart Care 175 

Here is my Haven 178 

Thy Guerdon 180 

Oh, Life and Love, How Sordid You 182 

Thy Faith 184 

The Night I Led You Home 186 

Son of My Youth 188 

Unborn 192 

Home I Came and Thou Wert Waiting 193 
The Love Which Ne'er a Cross Hath Known 194 

Unworthy 195 

Were I a Bard with Roses Crowned 196 

A Prayer 198 

MISCELLANY POEMS 

A Worshipper 201 

Life 203 

Recompense 204 

On a Portrait of Mary Stuart 206 

Credo Christi 208 

The Bishop 215 

My Debt to Thee, Thou Pleasant Weed 219 

A Fragment 222 

The Birthday 226 



THE PRO-WORD 

TO-DAY is mine for tranquil mood : 
As one that casts the sum of days, 
And, looking back upon the ways, 
Doth find the end alone is good, 

And finis still the happy phrase. 



To-day I chew no bitter food : 

The barren count of my past years, 
The fickle vows, the futile tears, 

The niggard fate, the fortune rude — 

All with a changed grace appears. 



IO YOUTH: 

So lives the hour when came the first 

Wild dream that, deep in my awed soul, 
There lay, like forming seed in scroll, 

By Nature's mystic process nursed, 

A poet thought, unborn yet whole. 

O fateful finding, fated hour 

When I did learn this wondrous thing! — 
A prophet Voice a word did bring 

That laid on me an evil dower, 

And still hath dues of suffering. 

A Voice which said: " A poet thou 

" Art glad to be? — well, very well; 
" But must thou take e'en what I tell, 
" More than the sadness of thy brow, 
" Shall signify this oracle. 



AND OTHER POEMS n 

" No myrtled ease can e'er be thine 

" Who, driven aye by harking need, 
" Shalt make the Muse herself to bleed 

" And aloes bitter drink for wine, — 

" Befitting thine own bitter meed. 

" Then shall a sore-divided toil 

" Perplex thy spirit with its hest; 
" And thou shalt beg in vain for rest 

" From gibing hours that aye despoil 

" Thy aching brain, thy barren breast. 

" And oft the strife for daily bread 

" Shall mock the secret, shamed task, 
" Where thou dost ever pause and ask, 

" If this be as a poet said, 

" Or wears the Muse an antic mask? 



12 YOUTH: 

" So shali the scant, reluctant fruit 

" Which thou mayst pluck at fearful while - 
" Still dreading moments that beguile 

" And leave the word unborn and mute — 
" So shall it win a scornful smile: — 

4 

" A smile of scorn, a pitying word; 

" Yet who that hates could wish thee more, 
" When sinks into thy soul's deep core 

" The shame thy fear hath oft averred, 

" And all thy hope is slain before? 

" And then will come the blighting thought, 
" How thou hast kept some solace out 
" Of thy hard lot, that, all devout, 

" Thy task unselfish might be wrought, 

" Tho' life's dear joys were put to rout. 



AND OTHER POEMS 13 

And of these dearest, tiny feet 

" That might not stray thy prison near, 
" Nor bring thee word of Eden cheer, 
" Nor little love thy love to greet, 

" Till thy poor rhyming scheme was clear. 

" And she whose gift of love to thine 

" Doth still accuse thy secret thought, 
" She, too, must widowed sit, unsought, 

" Till thou hast done thy meagre line, — 

" A verse with her lorn sadness bought." 

" Nay, curse the boon! " I cried as one 

With gall rubbed into cruel sore — 

" Peace thou, and trouble me no more, 
" Since thus so easy I may shun 

" What thou wouldst say Fate holds in store. " 



14 YOUTH: 

Then laughed the Voice, but other word 
It did not speak, and ended there: 
Yet all was fit to my despair; 

And ever hath my spirit heard 

In that strange mirth its Miserere. 

For truer prophet ne'er hath spoke: 

The pain, the sorrow and the shame 
Are mine — yet is not mine the blame 

That in an evil hour awoke 

The dream which soon a curse became. 

So|was it that but yesterday 

I yearned to give the struggle up; 
Since I have drunk the bitter cup, 

And blindly prove no better way 

For Sorrow, weary of her sup. 



AND OTHER POEMS 15 

Yet was it fated to the end 

(The Voice spake not of such release) 
Nor dare I thus to seek my peace, 

A marred destiny to mend, 

Till that First Cause shall bid me cease. 

Then let me offer you my rhyme, 

Poor product of the poet-trade, 
For have I not my call obeyed, 

Tho' this be writ from eldest time: 

To-day I burn, to-morrow fade ? 



Youth : 



A POEM OF SOUL AND SENSE 



" -whatsoe'er thy birth, 

Thou wert a beautiful thought and softly bodied forth." 

— Byron 



1 







T 



YOUTH 

k O you the strain that may not bring 
Or fame, or praise of sudden note; 
Or promise of a grace remote 

To crown this hearted offering. 

And yours the fault if, 'stead, befall 
To him that weaves, perforce, the lay, 
The judgments of an evil day, 

The hemlock draught of human gall. 

Sweet will it be for your sweet sake ; 
And Truth, whose vision finds no flaw 
In keeping of her sacred law, 

Shall of the shame a solace make. 



YO UTH: 

And this sufficeth — for the cant 
Of schools or critics pleaseth not; 
Nor their award shall clear or blot 

The page where she is habitant. 

Yet would I seek, ere sending forth 
What Youth and Truth have taught to me, 
A wanton inference to flee, 

A vicious folly's idle worth: 

That such might not disgrace the line 
Wherein my spirit hath revealed, — 
As from a fount in sleep unsealed, — 

The flowing of a high design. 

Shall it be said, with venal thought 
My soul laid bare her secret place; 



AND OTHER POEMS 2 

That some the guilty clue might trace 

Which their own sin and shame hath wrought?- 

That I did sell for certain coin 
What men would die of shame to speak; 
Nor recked to bear a callous cheek, 

Since pillory and profit join? — 

Well, be it so, — and let the cry 
The louder ring that all may heed: — 
Yet one still voice shall make a creed 

When clamor faints into the sky! 
-*> 

Graybeard, tell me not of age, 
With its shriving and its psalm : 

I do live and I do love, 
And my pulse shall feel no calm 



YOUTH: 

Till the need that throbs in me 
Die in passion, purged and spent, 

And I reach the frozen height 
Of thy wisdom's element. 

Oh, it seemeth yet so far 
I have mocked me at the truth, 

As a Hyperborean gibe 
In the zone of love and youth. 

Meantime, there is many a one 
Who shall cast a willing eye; 

And when love is at the full, 
Love may find a partner nigh. 

Spite of all your moral saws, 
This was written at the first; 



AND OTHER POEMS 23 

And the ages have not slaked 
Nature's aye renascent thirst. 

Ebb and flow, a changeless course, 
As with planets, so with men : 

Naught is lost — Antaean-wise, 
Strength so spent is strength again. 

Calyx, crystal, youth and maid, 
Chrysalis and bud and seed ; — 

Mark the Proteus in all, 
And in each the crescive need. 

What you call a lust'of flesh. 
Hath a strange grace in the flower, 

Soon as hooded sheath is cast 
In old Nature's working hour. 



24 YOUTH: 

Give us back the Golden Age 
(Still the latest bard shall sing) 

With the godlike race that drew 
All from Nature's holy spring: — 

When the simple rule of right 
Seemed the fit, sufficing code ; 

Liberty the common breath, 
Nature making Man and Mode. 

Vain to raise the distant cry — 
Yet the boon might be regained, 

Were each soul her sov'reign self, 
And each mind and force unchained. 

Thou, old man., who fain would st read 
Unto me a sermon stale, 



AND OTHER POEMS 25 

Keep it — if the priest say true, 
'Twill thy lasting peace avail. 

But for me the world new-breathes 
With the love-scent of the rose : — 

Thou art of the wasting ebb, 
I am of the tide that flows. 

Let me give, while thus I may, 
To the strong compulsive force, 

Urging human soul and sense 
In the cosmic fluid course. 

Lo! the cup is at my lips — 
Hast thou all forgot the spice? 

Wilt thou sweeter gain and drain 
In thy nearing Paradise? 



26 YOUTH: 

Thou yieldest, ah, thou yieldest — 
Sweet one, I lead thee blushing 

Unto the couch whence Love hath said 
None shall his banquet flee: 

My soul is drunk with rapture, 
My veins are fiercely flushing, 

The pride of youth is on me, 
And the proof of love must be! 

Long, long hath been the wooing — - 
Yet Love was never laggard, 

By day and night he softly stole 
Betwixt thy heart and mine; 

And when his vigils made him show 
A cheek too white and haggard, 

Then, then thy gentle pity flowed, 
A sweet remorse was thine. 



AND OTHER POEMS 27 

Thou tookst him in thy bosom — 
And with soft words relenting, 

Didst warm him back to life again, 
Yea, badest him live for thee : 

1 "Be mine the fated sin," thou criedst, 
" Be mine the sad repenting; 

" Lo! here my vestal zone unbound, 
" So thou wilt bide with me! " 

O rarest balm and healing! — 
Ee'n as the words were uttered, 

The boy did feel thy bosom's glow, 
And at thy kissing mouth 

His fainting spirit feebly clung, 
Till life that barely fluttered 

In deadly chill a moment thence, 
Drank in the vital south. 



28 YOUTH: 

So came the tender yielding — 
So, sweet, I lead thee blushing 

Unto the couch whence Love hath said 
None shall his banquet flee; 

My soul is drunk with rapture, 
My veins are fiercely flushing, 

The pride of youth is on me, 
And^the proof of love must be ! 



What is Nature? — Is it sin? — 
So the moralists begin ; 
And a shame will sudden rise, 
As to color the surmise, 
Till we see with clearer eyes ; 
Till the scales of custom fall, 
And the light illumine all. 



AND OTHER POEMS 29 

Then we nearer draw to God 

In the path the seers have trod ; 

Then old Sinai seems not high 

For the spirit's mastery. 

All is good which He hath made, 
There is neither mean nor great ; 

Nor of aught be thou afraid, 
Wouldst thou find the Central Fate. 

Shall a figleaf turn us back 
From the godhead's viewless track? 
Shall a priest-born, coward fear, 
When the dawn of Truth is near, 
Drive us from a vantage ground 
That the centuries have found? 



30 YOUTH: 

No! — the secret stress of Nature 
Holds a clue, if thou be brave; 

Every cycle sees a shackle 
Stricken from the moral slave : — 

Till, at last, in light erected, 
He shall taste the higher air; 

And the Infinite invite him 
Its eternal truth to share. 

For the freeing trend is forward, 
Tho' the march be ever slow — 

Yea, unseen, save by the Watcher 
O'er the struggle here below: 

But the years have each a story, 
As the garnered sum doth show. 



AND OTHER POEMS 3 1 

Wherefore, Censors, take ye heed 
How these pages you shall read. 
Tis not yours to quick condemn 
With a staled apothegm, 
If the present text and theme 
To your righteous judgment seem 
Such as irk the palate nice, 
Or to freer thought entice. 

Better that you give it o'er, 
Close the book and read no more ; 
For, tho' trivial the tale, 
Sooth, I see it will not fail 
To awake a critic scorn, 
And a moral screed adorn. 



32 YOUTH: 



If to keep from Truth aloof 
Be to 'scape your trite reproof, 
Mine shall be another choice, 
Spite the Pharisaic voice, 
And the swollen priestly pride 
(As for this had Jesus died ! ) 
Somewhat chastened in these days, 
Yet, with old dogmatic phrase, 
Dealing blame eterne or praise. 



As the sap mounts in the tree, 
Ere the young Spring sets it free, 
Blindly seeking liberty, — 
So the first desire of youth, 
Charged with Passion's early truth, 



AND OTHER POEMS 33 

Innocent of older feigning, 

Scarce the conscious impulse reining, — 

Rages — till a vent be found, 

And the flow relieve the wound. 



Who hath known the sick suspense 
Of a starved continence, 
Knoweth Nature's ordered law 
In the quick, all-melting thaw, 
Ere the love-god's subdued wrath 
Glean a languid aftermath : 
Naught is left desire, and then 
Builds the mystic force again. 

Here the spring of wonder hid, 
No o'ertopping pyramid; — 
This the process, this the course 
Whence to track the primal source; 



34 YOUTH: 



Life of life and birth of birth, — 
All the mystery is worth : — 
Searcher, strike your scalpel here, 
And the secret shall appear! 

Doth all Nature seem to pair 
With no wise, prolific care? 
Doth the seed mature and burst 
(Nature's miracle the first) 
Save in answer to a call, 
Bidding ripeness to befall? 

So renews the germ of life, 

So the vigor of the strife 

Freshly keeps its salt and sweet, 

Till the ultimate defeat. 
* * * 



AND OTHER POEMS 35 

Since confession may relieve 
Secret burthen of the soul, 
Making us in virtue whole 

For the sin it doth bereave ; — 

I will tell it, every word, 
Sparing neither pain nor bliss ; — 
Fools shall say, somewhat like this 

They have idly read or heard. 

But the wise shall better know, 
For the theme, tho' ever old, 
Hath not yet been fairly told, 

And it plucks all ears below : — 

Plucks, and yet small thanks be due 
To the weaver of the lay ; 
Few his fault will e'en gainsay, 

None will care to speak him true. 



36 YOUTH: 

He shall taste the bitter gibe 
And the bigot's damning blame ; 
Execrate shall be his name 

With the Pharisaic tribe. 

And a timid friend shall say: 
" Sooth, the word, the thought are good, 
" Yet but dimly understood 

" Till there come a broader day." 

This hath ever been the lot 
(Trite the saying) of the seer 
Who hath read his mission clear, 

And its penalty forgot. 

Be his need to stand alone, 
Blotting naught which here is writ ; 



AND OTHER POEMS 37 

Holding fast to what is fit, 

Lest the Truth be overthrown. 

Let him close the page who seeks 
What may please his grosser mood — 
Here is not a lustful food, 

But a Truth that truly speaks. 



Spring of youth, the lilt of lightness, 
Soul untouched with sin's alloy; 

All the world's ungained guerdon 
At the bidding of a boy. 

Now the happy earth-horizon 
Shall not hide the crested seas ; 

And the vision and the promise 
Searcheth down the centuries : 



38 YOUTH: 

Questing in the spoil of ages 
For a story that may suit, 

With no end or aim miscarried, 
And a rich resultant fruit. 

Oh, the riot and the rapture ! — 
Let the trial quick be made, 

Ere the fairy world hath melted 
And the bauble hope decayed. 

Swift as in the magic legend 
Vanishes the sudden scene, 

Comes the cruel disenchanter — 
All is as it ne'er had been ! 

Golden glamour, gay illusion, 
Bitter, yet divine deceit; 



AND OTHER POEMS 39 

And the future holds no promise 
That shall match the blessed cheat. 

Nay, the future is but yearning 
For the dream that once so thrilled 

With the glory of its seeming, 
And the guerdon unfulfilled ! 



Here is my boy, 

Blue-eyed and brave, 

A prince in his right: 
For the morning of joy 

To his will is a slave 

And his innocent sight. 
In his spirit too wild, 
Yet withal Nature's child. 



40 YOUTH: 

No kiss half so sweet 

As the touch of his lip 

In the freshness of morn 
Oh, my soul leaps to greet 

What a seraph might sip 

With a virtue new-born. 
Clinging fast to his love, 
May I not look above? 

A plague to my thought, 

To my couch an unrest, 

To my bosom a pain, 
That each day is fraught 
To him I love best 

With peril of stain: 
For his soul, like a glass, 
Mirrors aught that may pass. 



AND OTHER POEMS 41 

Oh, death! — must he learn 
What too early his sire 

Did prove to his loss, — 
Ere the soul could discern 

'Twixt the lower and higher, 

The gold and the dross; 
And the pearl without price 
Was exchanged for a vice? 

I know 'tis the curse 

Foreordained to our seed, 

And with fruit aye the same ; 
Yet nor better nor worse 

That it lives in a creed, 

And our God hath the blame: 
That He gave me this boon, 
But to blight it too soon. 



42 YOUTH: 

What need to repine? 

Say you then with the trite 

Air of one who would speak 
That which I do divine 

Hath nor fitness nor right, 

But a custom antique: — 
For men from the first 
Have this fantasy nursed. 

No! — my soul crieth out 

At the lie and the sham 

And the old make-believe: 
God's mercy to doubt, 

God's justice shall damn — 
But He may deceive! 
This is impious, say? — 
Well, then, let me pray: 



AND OTHER POEMS 43 

Dear Christ, he is mine, 

And the light I have lost 

Shineth out from his face: 
Dost Thou bid me resign 

, To the sea tempest-tossed, 

My sole anchor of grace ; 
That my frail fearsome barque 
Find no way in the dark? 

See, this lily of thine 

That a glory doth wear 

From thy garland of pain : 
With a tendance benign, 

Thou dost keep her so fair, 

And pure without stain : — 
Yet she hath not a soul, 
And the dust is her goal. 



44 YO UTH: 

And Thou saidst, Suffer such 

(As my child) to come near, 

For the Kingdom is theirs; — 
Yea, Thou lovest them much — 
Then, why do we fear, 

And still send up our prayers? 
Shall the Saviour not save 
By the promise He gave? 



Let me bring to an end ; — 

Yet for me not the phrase 

Of a credulous trust: 
It is true, I may mend 

With the long count of days 

Ere the darkness and dust : 
But the Heaven that may be 
Seems the child I now see. 
* * * 



AND OTHER POEMS 45 

So renews the ancient fable, 
So the gates of Eden close ; 

And the tree of cursed knowledge 
Wider spreads and ranker grows. 



Stands the angel minatory, 
Masking a divine regret ; 

While the banished heirs of Heaven 
Toil in agony and sweat. 



Shall that tree accursed still darken 
Till the light of God be lost? — 

Do we yet but feebly reckon 
What the primal sin hath cost? 



46 YO UTH: 

Oh, ashes gray! — Oh, chill of youth's eclipse !- 
Where now the magic beaker for the lips, 
Hot, hot and dry, like the distempered soul? — 
One drop, in mercy, for a sinner's dole : 
'Twill all renew the forfeited estate — 
Mayhap, set back the hand of moveless Fate! 



Now are stirrings of the spirit 
That a prophecy impart : 

Nameless thoughts and furtive fancies 
Into sudden being start. 

For a viewless hand is shaping 
Line of sinew, bent of brain ; 

Holding yet the truer balance 
That shall equalize the strain. 



AND OTHER POEMS 47 

See, a dark'ning iris showeth 
How the early prime is due ; 

And the forces of the future 
Seem to hint a certain clue ; 

While a nascent need hath lurking 
In his eye's translucent blue. 

Task and play are yet his portion, 
But a haunting thought intrudes; 

And the page shall lie regardless, 
While he sits and strangely broods : — 

Yea, the sport shall find him laggard 
For his irking interludes. 

And anon the spell is deepened, 
Till a secret stress doth vex; 

And the motive of his being 
More and more it shall perplex 

With the thing which yet it feareth, 
Tho' a timid Passion becks. 



48 YO UTH: 

So the hidden struggle passeth 
With its pain and anguish fraught; 

God alone a silent watcher, 
While the mystery is wrought. 



Oh, thou tender, brooding mother, 
Here is that thou mayst not see: 

Oh, thou sire, with formal vision, 
Was this, too, unproved by thee, 

Ere there came the riper wisdom, 
And the smug security? 



But the night shall bring surcease, 
Tho' he battle 'gainst the charm ; 

Baulking Sleep whose poppy fingers 
Faintly hint a first alarm: — 

Now, at last, in dreaming slumber 
Lies he there, with fancies warm. 



AND OTHER POEMS 49 

'Tis her hour — the Mystic Woman 
Who doth come when ripeness calls, 

E'en as come the winds of Autumn, 
When the fuller kernel falls. 

Never faileth she the summons 
Bidding her unto her own ; 

For the force of Nature working 
Makes the need of Nature known. 

Lo, her charmed presence seemeth 
To the gifted sense of sleep, 

As a figure in the arras 
Shall a strange enchantment keep. 

Naught she wears to veil the beauty 
Waking eye hath never seen ; 

Nor might Nature show her likeness 
'Mongst her miracles terrene. 



50 YOUTH: 

White is she, beyond all whiteness 
That on human sense hath dwelt; 

With divinest contours glowing, 
And a ravishment unfelt 

In the grosser play of passion 
With a woman of the flesh — 

Soon in this the lees of lewdness, 
Aye in that a charm afresh. 

Fairer than the nymph of fable 
Whom the classic fancy sees 

Loose her zone for love's fruition 
In the amorous Cyclades. 

Nay, my simile is idle 
To denote her wordless charm : 

See, the Paphian queen retireth — 
Vain her loveliness to harm. 



AND OTHER POEMS 51 

Not is hers the sinless rapture 
Of a soul as yet unstained ; 

With the secret seal unbroken, 
And the lethal curse ungained. 

Waiteth she another season, 
Ere her lure shall be employed ; 

r 

When the spirit, gross-entangled, 
Calleth shapes from out the void. 



Now the red cheek of the sleeper 
Shows the strife that hath begun, 

And a quicker pulse is telling 
Of the long expected One. 

Draws she near, while burns the hectic 
Earnest of her coming joy, — 

As she bore a gift of healing 
For his vexed soul's annoy. 



52 YOUTH: 

Doth no tender sorrow seize her, 
Bending soft his couch above; 

Marking all his wildered anguish, 
In the first desire of love? 



She, the beautiful, the heartless, 
Filcher of the young soul's faith, — 

Is not here a sight to soften 
E'en the rigor of a wraith? 

Had she pulse, or soul, or feeling, 
Might she not her mood relent, 

Ere the treasure hath been rendered, 
And the sacred phial spent? 

Aye ! — as sweeps the flood resistless 
From its long-locked mountain bed, 



AND OTHER POEMS 53 

When the icy fetters vanish, 
And the plain is overspread : — 

This the melting ruth she yieldeth 
To his vague, unformed prayer ; 

While his timid soul doth tell him, 
'Twere in vain that she forbear. 



Yet the force of his young spirit 

Uttereth a brave protest 

'Gainst the viewless toils that wrap him 

And the Shadow's eager hest. 

* * * 

Vain, oh, vain is all the striving, — 
She hath thrown his curtains wide, 

And he sinks inert, tho' conscious 
Of the vision glorified. 



54 YOUTH: 

Ne'er, oh ne'er was lady's wooing 
Of a fashion like to hers ; 

Cloying nuptial love's embraces, 
Making countless perjurers. 

And he answereth her challenge, 
Spite of utmost force of will; 

For the pulsing lack within him 
Hath a liquor to distil. 

Doth she speak? — as plays the zephyr 
In some music-haunted shell: — 

Hears his rapt soul the soft message 
She doth feel or feign so well : 

Love am L, and me thou knowest, 
Soon, ah, soon shalt better know, 

When the fond desire is rising, 
And the heats of rapture glow. 



AND OTHER POEMS 55 

Long this heart hath held the summons, 
Caught one tender hour from thine; 

Yet I waited for the moment 
Thou shouldst ripely blush as mine. 

Watched I o'er thy sweet unfolding 
Till the bud the fruit became: — 

Other hands shall gather after, 
But the first dear meed I claim. 

' Tis the time, nor may I linger 
When the debt of joy is due: — 

Love like mine hath little idlesse 
Love's sweet sin to bless or rue. 

Ah, this coyness! — L had feared it : 
Youth, do not the charm delay, 

While the friendly darkness driveth 
Yet afar the churlish day. 



56 YOUTH: 

Lo! I bring a balm of cooling 
For thy soul's compulsive fire: — 

' Twere unmeet thou shouldst deny me — 
Keeper of the world's desire ! 

See, oh youth, I shall not touch thee, 

Yet the night is much acold: — 

' Twere no dalliance should I ring thee 

In these arms a king may hold. 

* * * 

Is it better to lie, 

To spend and to burn 

With a secret desire ; 
Losing all in the fire, 
Getting naught in return, 
While love passeth by? 

Let your moralist say 

Who hath proved either way. 



AND OTHER POEMS 57 

Yet in rhyme let me wreak 

My deep loathing and scorn 

Of the lust-ridden fool, 
To whom Nature doth speak 
As to Adam new-born 

Out of Eden's chaste rule; 
Never changing the mood 
For a high interlude. 

Him rank I chief cursed 

'Mongst a race that has none 

Without some mark of ill; — 
For tho' Nature give thirst, 

And the draught must be won, 

Yet shall each get his fill : 
But the rage of the leech 
Doth its own lesson teach. 



58 YOUTH: 

If the touch of the flesh 

Leave a stain on the soul 

And a shame in the mind,- 
Is it not that, behind 
What our fears do control, 
Stick we fast in the mesh 

Of a creed that we ken 
Too exalted for men? 

And if One was who walked 
Without shadow of sin 

Or a prompting of lust, — 
Is it fair that we must 
So our righteousness win ? 
And will Nature be baulked 

Of the meed of her due, 
Since a God might eschew ? 



AND OTHER POEMS 59 

No, no ! — And the lie 

Beareth fruit of its kind, 

And will bear to the last : — 
So the Levites are classed 
As of those with a mind 
The old Adam to ply, 

And those who pluck free 
Of the flesh and the tree! 

Yet 'twere better, perchance, 
Could a man put aside 

The torment of his blood ; 
Tho' I hold not the good 
Are they only that hide 
From the spell of Love's glance : 
Starving ever the need 
That conflicts, with a creed. 



60 YOUTH: 

But if all things were free 

As God's light and God's air 

(Why not all as are these ?) 
Then, in glad liberty, 

Love should find himself fair, 

Nor desire a disease: 
And a new race might rise, 
Fit for earth and the skies. 

Such a race as once trod 
In the fable or fact 

That is lost to our ken ; 
When the fair Sons of God, 

With a strange lust attacked, 

Stooped as rivals to men ; 
And forgot their high birth 
For the Daughters of Earth. 



AND OTHER POEMS 6 1 

Cruel in her strong enchantment, 
Quick her lips are at his mouth; 

And the fragrance of her breathing 
Stolen seems from the sweet south. 

Oh, the clinging and the coyness, 
And the lips that turn away 

When desire is hotly mounted 
For the unavailing fray! 

Could he rend the veil of slumber, 
All her charm might yet be vain, 

And the baffled phantom driven 
Out from bed and heart and brain. 

But a deadness that increaseth 
Holdeth him entoiled, supine : 

Feareth he the last encounter 
And the ripe Semitic wine.* 



* The Semitic milk.— Walt "Whitman. 



62 YO UTH: 

And a vampyre's thirst is gladness 
To the fever now he feels : 

Soul and sense are wildly burning, 
Yet her lip the plague aneles. 

Soon his pudent fear or feigning 
Shrinketh not from new alarms ; 

And the regnant need and rapture 
Give him wholly to her arms. 

Lo ! she folds him in embraces 
Till the strife to madness leads: — 

Yet reluctant he to render 
That for which she mutely pleads. 

Worn, at last, and spent, and beaten, 
Shame and wrath he fain defers ; 

And, before the morning cometh, 
The fond victory is hers ! 



AND OTHER POEMS 63 

Still that fashion old endureth : — 

Ere the living bride be won, 
Youth must bed the Phantom Lady, 

And the tides of love must run. 

Now the world is changed 
And a new dawn breaks; 

And the working spell 
Its unquiet makes. 

Cuts the Serpent's tooth 
With its elder pain ; 

And the destined curse 
Stuns the glad refrain 

Of the bounding earth 
And the skies at wheel — 

This shall still be heard, 
Tho' the centre reel! 



64 YO UTH: 

For the fruit is plucked, 
And the sheath is rent: 

Gone are simple peace 
And the first content. 

These no more shall come 
To a breast at ease ; — 

Life hath nothing left 
That may wholly please. 

'Tis enough to pay 
For the fated boon : — 

Were't to do again, 
Not again so soon. 

O'er and o'er he beats 
This upon his brain : 

Were she now to come, 
He the strife would gain. 



AND OTHER POEMS 65 

With a stronger will 
And a chastened force — 

Sure her charm would fail, 
And her ancient course. 

But 'tis done, 'tis done; 
And the ill abides, 
And a Fate derides 

While the web is spun ! 

* * * 

Thou who dost give thyself 
Wholly to me, 

Thy soul-kiss, thy mouth-kiss 
With like ecstasy: 

Say, dost thou hearken 
Unto the sad voice, 

Still knelling the hour 
When the worm shall rejoice ? 



66 YOUTH. 



Nay, thou scornest the text, 
And I lie here, supine, 

While ever thou wooest 
With languor divine: 

Thy lips dropping balsam, 
Thy heart breathing sighs; 

Thy sweetness seducing 
To love's last emprise. 

Now, now in the fashion 
Of gods and of men, 

I seek thee in rapture, 
Again and again: — 

As a brook to the river, 
I give unto thee, 

And thou yieldest all 
To love's infinite sea. 



AND OTHER POEMS 67 

Oh, God, how thou bindest 
My soul in thy thrall ! — 

The tides of thy love-life 
To my currents call; 

And quick to their bidding 
The responsive flow — 

Yea, tho' thou drain me, 
I might not forego! 

I cling to thy rose-mouth 
And drink thy sweet breath, 

Till love find the guerdon 
That seemeth like death: — 

I die in the giving — 
Ah, sweet, let me go, 

Thus loving and vanquished, 
The Secret to know. 



68 YOUTH: 

Nay, now thou recallest 
With love's vital kiss 

My spirit that fainted 
With overmuch bliss. 

A kiss on the forehead, 
A kiss on the lips, 

And my soul passeth out 
From her recent eclipse. 

So I nurse at thy mouth, 
And I warm at thy breast, 

And thou lovest me more 
For the weakness confessed. 

I know not the dearer — 
The joy I now feel, 

Or the rapture that came 
When my life thou didst steal. 



AND OTHER POEMS 69 

And what of the preacher, 
And what of the grave, 

The worm and the darkness ? 
Shall thy kisses save 

From these in their season 
The lover whose lip 

Clings to thine as if there 
'Twould eternity sip ? 

Nay, I care not — enough 
That we live, that we love; 

For us not the doubting 
Below or above : — 

Thy> soul-kiss, thy mouth-kiss 
The food which I crave, 

And, death's easy conquest, 
Thy bosom my grave! 



7© YOUTH: 

Oh, Lady, I have loved you 
With a passion all too warm : 

Loth was I to hear the story 
That you do your lovers harm. 

Passing sweet our nightly trysting, 
Till the boy's cheek grew too pale, 

And an elder wisdom whispered, 
Other love should now prevail. 

Then we parted — yet, believe me, 
I have not your rival found 

In the ranks of fleshly beauties, 
Grossly seeking to astound 

With a mode of love barbaric 
(So unlike your subtle way) — 

Fierce invoking gentle Eros, 
To the timid god's dismay. 



AND OTHER POEMS 7 1 

Dear, forgive that, having known you, 
I could stoop to charms like theirs : — 

'Tis, alas! the cursed folly 
That directs our low affairs. 

Fie upon the need! — tho' Nature 
Hath herself prescribed the cure; — 

Rankest disillusion lurking 
Where the shame-god sets his lure; — 

He who seeks the loveless traffic, 
Seeks a pang that shall endure. 

For the ghost of old uncleanness 
Ever on my sleep doth fawn ; 

Satyr-like, she grins beside me 
'Twixt the night and shamed dawn : 

Tho' I fiercely curse her, waking, 
Yet the spell is not withdrawn. 



72 YOUTH: 

Might I ever hope to rid me 
Of a part of mine own soul ? — 

Priest, what grace have you, or unction, 
That shall serve to make me whole; 

With a sinless future opened, 
And the past a chastened scroll ? 

And the sting of fetid passion, 
Sickly surfeit, bitter blame, 

Cankering the soul's pure places 
With a viper brood of shame : — 

Have not these avenged her fully 
On her votary of old ? 

Is there yet a deeper penance 
Ere her sum of wrath be told — 

Does she weave a Nessus garment 
His poor shrinking frame to hold ? 



AND OTHER POEMS 73 

No! — our ancient love forbids it: — 
Let me say a last adieu : 

What was mine, beyond all purchase, 
Freely gave I unto you ; 

Other lusts have yielded loathing, 
Other loves have made me rue. 

-•> 
Oh, Eros, say what witching spell is hers, 
That none may number her fond worshippers : 
Paphos is gone and all the rosy crew 
That sought the pagan cestus to undo; — 
But still she reigns, and few do 'scape her toil, 
And the first fruits of love are her despoil. 

Ee'n^tho' I sing of her in idle strain, 

Nor seek a laurel or a leaf to gain, 

Yet, yet a pang will come to stab me through, 



74 YOUTH: 

And old Remorse, reviving, query, "|Who 

" Is this that tells a tale with cap and bell? 

" Methinks a sackcloth would become him well." 
* * * 

Was it lure like hers that made 
Phryne's unforgotten trade; 
Holding Hellas in such spell 
That her memory shall dwell 
Long as lives the Theban tale, 
Till all human story fail, 
And the world forget the day 
When she cast her zone away; 
Gravest justicers to quail 
With the charms she did unveil; — 
Whitest bosom, flashing forth, 
Making naught their wisdom's worth ; 



AND OTHER POEMS 75 

Nestling loves, in startled fear, 
Pleading for their mistress dear, 
Claiming judgment, in despite, 
For the godlike wanton's right; 
While the beauty-seeing Greek 
Did his rapt approval speak. 

Had the Lady of the Nile 
Such a magic in her smile? 
Drew she lovers from all climes 
To beguile her softer times? 
With a Caesar in her bed, 
Was her longing surfeited? — 
Till the conquering cuckold turned, 
Till her grosser passion burned, 
And the newest slave's employ 
Were her avid sense to cloy. 



76 YOUTH: 

Was she queen of hearts, in truth, 

With a universal sway, 

Like to her whose ageless youth 

Reacheth to our later day ; 

Or a crowned courtesan, 
Seeking only hearts to ban 
With her lewd and fatal charm 
That no virtue might disarm : 
Making bagnio of a throne, 
Loving for her lust alone? 

Was she such as Fulvia's tongue 
(In the false Triumvir's ear, 

How the bitter accents rung 
When the shameful end was near!) — 

Was she such, I say, as she, — 

Type of Roman purity, 

With her pride of stainless birth, 



AND OTHER POEMS 77 

And her consciousness of worth, — 
Sounded — till the tale spread far, 
And the half-world leaped to war? 

Had the Ptolemaic charm 

But a bounded power to harm, 

Or to bless? — 'twere much the same, 

As, with Antony the game, 

And a world to win or lose, 

She the bauble did refuse; 

Choosing a sublime defeat, 

With her lover in retreat, 

Vain to ask her sov'reign fate, 
Now some centuries too late : 
Closed the page — e'en like her tomb 
That affronts the final doom : 
Ancient scandal holds the tale — 
Read ye there, nor idly rail. 



73 YO UTH: 

Yet nor Egypt's queen, nor she, 
Theme of eldest poesy 
(Whom to clasp were worth the price 
Of the Christian's Paradise) — 
Paris' fate and Troy's despair, 
Might her deathless charm compare 
With the Mystic Woman white, 
Giving all the world delight! 

She had altars ere Astarte — 
Back unto the farthest eld, 

You shall trace her long dominion 
Thro' the bosoms she hath quelled. 

Here the earth-bound, dark Egyptian 
Delving to the central womb, 

Doth confess his sullen homage, 
And enshrine it in a tomb. 



AND OTHER POEMS 79 

Here the Greek, distraught with beauty, 
Woos her in a goddess' guise, 

And the dream takes form immortal 
To amaze our changed eyes. 

Lo ! the priest within the temple, 
While he hugs a gross desire, 

Off ere th his guilty worship, — 
And there falls no penal fire! 

Look ye down the age chivalric : — 
Knights in mortal jousting play; 

Feats of prowess, deeds of daring 
For a lady's favor pay. 

Let the boldest champion answer, 
If the silken glove he wears, — 

Pledge of honor, truth and knighthood, 
Fond inspirer of his prayers, — 



80 YO UTH: 

Were so cherished, did the vision, 
Comforting his nightly tent, 

Bring not love's divinest philter 
To relieve his longings pent. 
-*> 

So it passes — and the story- 
Is as ever but the same ; 

Touching all earth's wide conditions 
With its glory and its shame. 

Prince and pontiff, knight and noble, 
Partnered all her sweet amour: — 

Ah, the saints, too, had their longings 
Which an Ave might not cure. 

Doth not Austin tell the story, 
With the frankest aim to please; 

Counting o'er his days of dalliance, 
Passion's tender rosaries; — 



AND OTHER POEMS 81 

Saying how the wantons plucked him 
By his garment of the flesh, 

Till his saintship grew a burthen, 
And he sought the Devil's mesh. 

Oh, the tale of anguished striving, 
Maceration, penance dire, 

Fasting, swoon and lonely vigil 
To forestall the cleansing fire: — 

Then the plucking of the senses 
With the soul at constant arm ; 

For the flesh that lives on lentils 
Yet recalleth woman's charm. 

And across the saint stylitic 
Comes a madness passing sweet; 

Turning all his peace to torment, 
Threatening his soul's escheat. 

-*5 



82 YOUTH: 

I would I were a monk of old, 

A little garden plot to fend, 
A simple faith to point the end, 

Nor any fear that in the mould 

The trust might with the saint descend. 

No cowled one than I more prompt 
To rise upon the matin call, 
When grayly leaving each his stall, 

To pray that thro' the day's accompt 
And silent lapse no sin befall. 

And if among the holy band 

Were some with souls untempered yet 
To view the past without regret, 

The touch of woman's cheek or hand, 

Mayhap, still bringing unquiet: — 



AND OTHER POEMS 83 

Oh, mine the task to strive with these, 
Until they yield me up, perforce, 
That which, half joy and half remorse, 

Lies deeper than the litanies, 

And leads the soul an errant course. 

" Thou," would I say, ''thou beadsman there, 
" That shamest all upon thy knees, 
" Think not thy r guilty ecstasies 

" To hide behind a mask of prayer — 

" As all were here Love's devotees! 

" Come, she was fair and she was young: 

" Still tellest that upon thy beads? — 
" And thou dost listen while she pleads, 

" Tho' psalm be said or vesper sung, 

" And thy weak heart a memory leads. 



YO UTH: 

" And thou didst love her — yea, mayhap, 

" (My vows defend!) didst often taste 
" A liquid lip, — and now dost waste 

" Thyself, as sighing in her lap 

" For more than she hath yet unlaced. 

" Oh, sweet, forsooth, to think how thus 

••' She gave her ripe mouth's scarlet bow, 
" When thou hadst been befooled enow: 

" Until thou saidst, still avid, plus 

" One full joy more would Heaven endow. 

" Nay, say not if thou hadst her — all! 

" My shriving asketh not so much; 

" And if thy raptures have a touch 
" Of grossness, sooner will they pall, 

" Since vision feeds not long on such. 



AND OTHER POEMS 85 

" Bethink thee of thy votive grace 

" And of thy soul's undying care: 
" Then wilt thou risk the last despair 

" For dreaming of a woman's face, 

" Tho' Heaven's host show none so fair? 

" A phantom love, that will not leave, 

■' Unless thou break, for once and all, 

" With this which binds thy soul in thrall, 

" And ever doth the peace bereave, 

" The peace that makes thy holy call. 

" A dead love, looking from a past 

" Set o'er with rosemary and rue: — 
" And thou forever pledged to strew 

" The idle leaves, until at last 

" Thou mingle with the dust and dew. 



86 YO UTH: 

" Oh, take not thou the foolish boast 

" How love like thine shall aye endure; 
" But yield thy soul for pious cure, 

" And keep thy marrow from the Ghost 

" That woos thee with her ancient lure." 
■^ 

Is't not railed well? — But well or ill, 
Were I a monk of olden time, 
This would I put in prose and rhyme, 

To keep our souls forefended still — 

' ' Shun thought of Her if ye would climb! ' ' 
* * * 

Did she seek the desert places, 
Bringing her own vague delight 

To the filbert-fed, ascetic, 
Dreaming seer or eremite? 



AND OTHER POEMS 87 

Whispering that here was solace, 
Nor a touch of conscious sin; 

Till the soul that dwelt in visions 
Let the subtle Temptress in? 

Oh, ye tombs of silent Thebaid, 
Might I gather from your dust 

Truth of avid worm and eyeless, 
That on saints hath fleshed his lust, — 

'Twere, mayhap, to hear a message, 
Couched in phrase akin to this : 

Nature still is one and changeless, 
And her end she cannot miss. 

Saddest fools. ! — we lie in atoms 
* Neath the soft Egyptian sky, 

Where we scorned the way of loving, 
In the time so long gone by. 



88 YO UTH: 

Oh, the frantic dream of Heaven 
That possessed our souls in vain! — 

Oh, the cozened sweet of sweetness 
That shall ne'er be ours again ! 

Gone, too, He, the Galilean, 
Whom we thought the Paraclete; — 

And the dusty ages mock us 
For the folly and the cheat ! 

Oh, if Nature might be tempted 
Once to change her swerveless course, — 

Recreating these dead atoms 
By her trick of chemic force; 

And the gladsome gift of living 
Fall as thus we mutely plead, — 

Like the gracious rain that quickens 
Worm and insect, bud and seed: — 



AND OTHER POEMS 

Might the earth endure our joyaunce — 
Might the latest-born of men 

Gaze upon us without madness, 
In the sweet of life again: — 

Then zvould fade the dreams portentous 
That do darken yet the sphere, 

Where we lived in deeper shadow 
Than is now our garment here. 

Men should learn an hour of living 
Far transcends a mythic trust; 

And the love-beat of an instant 
Worth an ceon in the dust! 

'Mid the fall of human altars 
Would arise a music sweet, 

As the truth of man erected 
Should the truth of Nature greet. 



90 YOUTH: 

Free the Heavens wide of terror, 
And the human face of tears; 

Gone the tragic past of sorrow, 
While the present joy appears ! 

Life and love and sun sufficing, 
As in eldest, simplest time; 

And the tmiversal travail 
Made as easy as a rhyme. 

Vain the dream ! — we lie in atoms, 
'Neath a sky we may not see: 

Working germ and dust of Nature, 
With no hand to set us free. 

Ye who tread in our dead footprints, 

Will ye learn a truth like this ? — 

Nature aye is one and changeless, 

And her end she cannot miss ! 

* * * 



AND OTHER POEMS 91 

Come, Age, with thy phlegm, 

Thy laugh that makes pain 

Or a tolerant sneer; ■ 

Leave to youth that may stem 

Passion's current amain, 

What was hope once or fear: — 
Thy struggle is ended, 

Thy harbor is won ; 
And a lightness is waxing 

Thy old wits may shun. 

For the laugh of a boy 

Will ring up to the stars, 

And the earth-juices leap 
At its challenge of joy — 

Yea, the welkin unbars 

That the planets may keep 
Its echoing music 

Their chorus among; 



92 YOUTH: 

Since the eldest which circle 

Still, still have been young. 

But thy mirth hath a strain 

That still vexes the soul, 

And falls harsh on the ear:- 
To thy beadstring again, 

And bethink of the goal 

That affronts thee so near. 
Dost thou think to renew 

The lost guerdon of youth, 
With thy pitiful gibe 

And thy grimace uncouth? 

Do thou draw with thy staff 

Some conceit in the sand, 

As in childhood thy wont; 



AND OTHER POEMS 93 

'Twill not vex like thy laugh 

That thou scarce canst command, 

While thou broodest upon 't: — 

Get thee blocks, too, and build 

With a grave hand and slow ; — 

Yea, and cry if they fall — 

But thy laughter forego ! 

And for this do men pray, 

When desire hath an end, 

And the hot strife is done: — 
So surcease and decay 

Hath a grace that will mend 

What a dead force must shun. 
'Tis a moral at which 

Ye may smile or may weep ; 
Yet from ages unnumbered 

No more shall ye reap. 
. -»> 



94 YOUTH: 

And the age new-democratic, 
With its equal lie for all, 

And its cant of thought and science 
That the Infinite forestall, — 

Hath it found a way to free us 
Of this cursed carnal want 

Making of the soul celestial 
Fetid earthly habitant? 

Nay, it hath not, and the spirit 
Of the newest age recurs 

To the day of ancient freedom, 
And a mighty longing stirs — 

Stirs and links with touch electric 
Thro' the universal chain, 

Till the systems seem to crumble 
And the world be free again. 



AND OTHER POEMS 95 

Is there force to hold the peoples 
In a broken priestly rod, 

With the spirit's bursted fetters 
That were formed or feigned of God? 

See, the tender Christ, despairing, 
Turns away his tearful face ; 

Weeping as He wept o'er Zion 
And the unrepentant race. 

Not is thine the fault, O Mourner, 
If the world must turn from Thee, 

With thy simple creed of kindness 
And thy simpler mystery. 

Kindest Thou of all the prophets, 
Son of God, too, fitly called, 

Since Thou brought'st the word of mercy 
To a world by hate enthralled. 



96 YOUTH: 

Yet I see thy reign is passing, 

And thy gospel as a breath : 

Larger spaces ever sund'ring 

From the Man of Nazareth. 

* * * 

And the Lady who hath moved me 
To this all unequal strain, — 

Doth she count as many lovers 
As in Passion's older reign? 

Yea, her score is now the greater, 
And her charm hath wider scope, — 

Tho' the phallus be no token, 
And a saint doth sit as Pope. 

And men do call her Succuba, 
And some do curse her shrine — 

She, the daughter of Belial, 
Masked with a grace divine. 



AND OTHER POEMS 97 

Cometh she, the Elder Temptress, 
To the Eden-lighted soul, 

Banishing the peaceful vision, 
Showing Passion as the goal. 

Smell of sin and death ariseth 
With the incense of her pride; 

And a Hellish glare is lurid, 
As from graves unsanctified ! 

Say, is this a monkish figment, 
Feigned to awe the common horde, 

That the soul be kept in shadow, 
And the priest may play the lord? 

Some, I know, do speak her beauteous 
As the nymph that Numa sought ; 

Sprung from love's desired fruition, 
In an ecstasy of thought : — 



98 YOUTH: 

Bringing love's first dream of rapture, 
Wooing like the pregnant south, 

When the earth, athirst and fainting, 
Lyeth in the languid drought : — 

Whispering the need of Nature, 
As with Nature's truth endued 

So to break the mystic summons 
That the race may be renewed. 
-»> 

This the fable to my liking, 
And I bid the priest begone, 

Ere, with mummery and missal, 
He drive out the Witching Qne. 

Be she Succuba or siren, 
Dragging souls to hopeless bale; 

Or a vision beatific, 
Crowning love's divinest tale: — 



AND OTHER POEMS 99 

I do owe her debt of gladness, 
And in poet fashion pay 

What the tongue is weak to utter, 
Nor the Muse may frankly say. 



Jgf 



iLofC. 



Urbs Ir^e 



YO UTH: 



URBS IRiE 

1 STOOD in a splendid city, 
The gem of the new world's crown : 
Riches and beauty in glancing forms, 
A myriad marvels shown. 

There was the glamour of sudden wealth, 
The opulence that springs 

From a turn unhoped in the tide of trade, 
Making the needy kings. 

And there was the pride that keeps true pace 
With a bastard wealth's increase ; 

Feigning a fabulous pedigree, 
Seeking a lineal lease ; — 

Rankly effusing its poison round, 
Tainting the freer air, 

Where a statued lie illumed the way 
To the dreamer's last despair! 



AND OTHER POEMS 103 

All that the genius of newest time, 
With wonder-working hand, 

Can raise at the bidding of vain caprice, 
With millions to command, — 

There dazzled and clomb till the tale grew trite, 
Attesting the power of gold : 

And nothing that men deem worth a thought, 
But there was bought and sold. 

Manhood and honor — the precious truth 
Of a woman's stainless soul, 

The celestial ray of the early hope, 
The glimmer of age's dole; 

The principle high as the polar star, 
Showing the God-marked course; 

The passionate dream of a regnant right 
Supplanting a mailed force; 

The vision that vieweth gold as dross, 
Till the test is brought too near, 

And the dreamer huggeth the yellow snare, 
Scorning his wiser fear: — 



104 YOUTH: 

All these esteemed as of common ware, 
And offered in common mart, 

With a jewing cant and a cunning thrift 
That sickened the honest heart. 

And the God of the ancient worship, — 
Had He no votive shrine 

'Mong the thousand fanes of the city, 
Beseeming a high design : — 

None where the Christ of the humble heart 
And toilsome path obscure, 

Might rest awhile on His weary way, 
Nor feel that He was poor? 

Nay, they builded the temple and palace 
Of an equal clay and stone ; 

And sealed unto High Jehovah 
The shrine that is Mammon's own. 

And the Word of His sacred giving 
Is wrested to meanings new; 

And a politic priest hath an anxious care 
Lest the old should still seem true. 



AND OTHER POEMS 105 

The prophets are sunk to a low estate, 
And the Word that Israel thrilled 

Hath a quibbling toil for the new elect, 
In learned doubting skilled. 

For the elders are chosen with thrifty aim 
For that which was Dives' loss ; 

And the rugged text of the Scripture 
Must carry a saving gloss. 
-•4 

Rich is the air with an incense rare, 
And the eye hath a novel feast 

With the stained glory of pictured saints, 
And the gorgeous hues of the priest. 

Holy of holies, — 'tis written thus — 
Well, well, let externals go: — 

Mayhap, there is something of holiness, 
Despite the offending show. 

And the lady who kneels in her rich attire, 
Nor ruffles a fragrant fold, 

Nor mars a line of her stately grace, 
Till the service long be told ; — 



106 YOUTH: 

Mayhap, 'neath the swathings of outer pomp, 
Enforced by her high estate, 

There worships with holiest zeal a heart 
That is never with pride elate. 

Such have been known in the older day, 
Yea, some that the purple wore 

Gained a fadeless crown with the golden toil 
Which in humbleness they bore. 

I do not hold that the saints are all 
Returned to mortal dust; 

For one hath but died whom the lepers blessed, 
And who cherished a Christ-like trust! 

And here, perchance, in a temple proud 
That vexes the thoughtful soul, 

The strife of saintship is bravely borne, 
And the cross appears the goal. 

But I do not wait for the preacher, — 
Too oft hath his formal word 

And rhetoric polished for ears precise, 
My soul's resentment stirred. 



AND OTHER POEMS 107 

Never a spark struck out in the heat 
Of a righteous soul at arm ; 

But a pulseless theme, and a lifeless word, 
And a cold and cultured charm. 

Forth let me fare to the city's heart, 
Lit now with electric sheen ; 

The garish newness of recent wealth 
In a riant radiance seen. 

And the fabled calm of the Sabbath, 
It here hath found no place; 

For Passion enticeth with lure polite, 
In the splendor of silk and lace. 

Where are the mothers whom God shall bless 
And touch with His fruitful hand, 

That the seed may be good, and the sowing 
Bring gladness to the land? 

Surely not here where the Serpent walks 
As in fallen Paradise; — 

Where Lust hath her mart and a virtue rare 
Shall bid for the highest price ! 



io8 YOUTH: 

Alas ! — and the seraphs seem to wear 
The garment of scarlet hue ; 

For many are here in their freshest youth, 
As there were naught to rue ! 

Eyes that still keep the chast'ning ray 
Of a virtue and truth forespent; 

Now sadly waking a dream divine — 
And anon a gross intent. 

Lips that might utter the precept wise 
Of a household's gentle sway, 

From the royal right of a throned love — 
Yet made for a wanton play. 

Forms that were cast in an angel mould, 
At bidding of common lust: 

Betrayed and betraying unto the end — 
The end that men call just! 

And souls partaking the deathless lot, 
But marked for a woe eterne — 

If the God of all mercy teach aright 
Where we His truth discern. 



AND OTHER POEMS 109 

Oh, preacher! who prate with a cultured mode 
And a moral entirely nice — 

(For God's man once was a man of fire, 
But now is a thing of ice) — 

Come, drop for the nonce your pretty ways 
That the higher dames approve ; 

And show the lie of your priestly frock, 
When a wrathful pulse shall move 

The man whom you hide with conscious shame — 
As a Levite had cause to pray 

That the God who gave him his soul of grace, 
Might take his sex away ! 

Now for a flaming word, as of old, 
When the moved prophet spoke, 

And the mighty were humbled before His face, 
And the idols of Assur broke. 

Curse me the guilty wealth that doth hold 
These hapless in silken sin; 

Mocking the tale of the Magdalen 
And the grief that gnaws within ! 



to YOUTH: 

Curse me the bitter, narrowing want 
That assaileth the young soul's truth ; 

Till the tempted falls and a golden bribe 
Stands aye for her bartered youth ! 

And if you have yet a deeper curse 
Than e'er fell from damning seer, 

Let it blight and wither the social lie 
That reads a judgment here 

In the red perdition of countless souls, 
Created with aim benign — 

As God were a pander to lust of men, 
And the sin had a seal divine! 

Call you the judgment that yet shall burn 
In the guilty souls of men, 

When the High God sendeth His lightnings forth 
To claim His world again. 

Let it ring from your carved pulpit 
Till the deaf of heart shall heed ; 

Till the blind of soul shall see the light 
And|the fated sentence read ! 



AND OTHER POEMS m 

Think not of the scoff, the formal sneer, 
And the proud one's pointed spleen : — 

Was not such the daily, sufficing food 
Of the guiltless Nazarene? 

Cry out on the godless shrine of gold, 
Where the barren soul and blind 

Pretendeth a worship that sees no more 
Than the gilded things designed 

To move a wonder that wealth is poured 
To the God of a hollow creed ; 

Whose word of mocking and error and doubt 
And sin is the fruitful seed ! 

Speak you and spare not, oh, trembling seer! 
While the hour be not too late: — 

It may save ten just from the city, 
Ere His vengeance close the gate! 



* 



H2 YOUTH: 



A BELATED SINGER 

ALL song was sung before his clay, 
Tho' some few voices rose to fail: 
The happy lyre, like Holy Grail, 

Was borne from human sight away. 

Far, far from strife and earthly clang 
He knew the bards triumphant sat; 
And raised their own Magnificat 

With strain immortal as they sang. 

Then went his soul unto them forth, 
To breathe its timorous desire, 
That something of their hallowed fire, 

Some grace of their unfading worth, — 

Might fall by their high will to him 
Who, born upon an evil time, 
Sought solace in the elder rhyme, 

Nor recked of fashion's newest whim. 



AND OTHER POEMS 113 

As in a vision it befell 
He rose unto the Mount of Song, 
And heard eternal airs prolong 

The master minstrels' mighty spell. 

Fain would his spirit then have sunk 
With shame unto its human sphere, 
But lo! its course was vain to steer — 

With one deep draught of glory drunk. 

And thus he staid, with eyes downcast, 
Yet conscious of the splendor there ; 
The wondrous song he might not share, 

The light that still forbore to blast. 

The bards looked coldly from their seat 
Upon the earthly stained one, 
And ceased the strain that, half begun, 

The choral spheres might not complete: — 

All save He, first of that bright throng; 
With crown of amaranth and gold, 
And harp whose deep note ever told 

The linked pause for prayer or song. 



114 YOUTH: 

Himseemed he elder than the rest, 
And on his brow a Jovian seal — 
The thought spun like a magic reel 

Until the marvel was confessed. 
»*> 

So swept a joy that half was fear 
Upon the questing stranger soul: 
For here was Poesy, the whole, 

And Fancy's dream-born chart writ clear. 

And now there turned on me the gaze 
That vainly sought the Scian sky, 
Yet thro' the far futurity, 

Saw glory without count of days, 

For him who wrought all time to please, 
When closed the world of living light, 
And opened realms of inner sight 

Unto the rapt Maeonides. 

Then all of wonder deep and awe 
That ever tranced a waiting soul, 
As, on the verge of Heaven's goal, 

The veil was lifted and it saw, — 



AND OTHER POEMS 115 

Came o'er me as I looked on him 
Whose master touch the spirit frees 
From the long thrall of centuries — 

Till all save Greece and Troy be dim. 
-•» 

O shallow hearted, hateful time, 
Whose every pedant fool shall say, 
The sum is more than yesterday, 

And just beyond the true sublime : — 

What harder fate might e'er befall 
The soul with poet yearning cursed, 
Than with thy gall to slake the thirst, 

And thy deaf heart to heed the call? 

'Tis not the whole that Pan is dead, 
And all the shining fable gone, 
With that strange light which dwelt upon 

His poet land, from cape to head ; — 

For this the world too long hath known : 
But, worst to come, the final loss, 
When, abject with its gained dross, 

Fain would it for the past atone; 



n6 YOUTH: 

And weep its unavailing tears 
For Pan and all his gracious kind ; 
And cry upon the folly blind 

That led it captive thro' the years! 

Then thus He spake: " Sing, if thou mayst, 
" Yet unto us look not for aid: 
" Forgot is all our human trade, 

" And higher themes are aye to taste. 

" Nor let the foolish dream beguile 
" That thou may'st win an equal place 
" With us the chosen of the race 

" Of bards, since first the sun did smile. 

" Lo! hath our circle been complete 
" Since he that wrought th' Arthurian lay 
" Did put his earthly lyre away, 

" And come unto his proper seat. 

" Yet is this vain — still wilt thou sing, 
" For ne'er was poet so advised: 
" And I mind me of one despised — 

" Ah, well! — it is too old a thing. 



AND OTHER POEMS 117 

" Peace unto thee, if yet thou must: 
Tho' I have said, the songs are sung, 
And all the rhymed changes rung, 

" And all the singers come to dust! " 

The deep harp spake, the grand refrain 
Ascended from his crowned compeers, 
Till, echoed by the list'ning spheres, 

The choral answer rang again. 

But e'er the swell again arose, 
My soul did sink from that far steep : 
Yet something of the strain 'twill keep 

When song and singer find repose. 



Ii8 YOUTH: 



EUTHANASY 



H 



ERE'S the end of it all — not the end I have sought 
Or feared, when the Darkness came into my 
thought: — 



Just a waiting at last, without pulse, without breath; 
And the loved eyes, the sleepless, now weep "This is 
Death!" 

Not dead, oh, not dead! — tho' it be but a space 
That e'en Time shall not mark — yet an infinite grace. 

Never lived I till now : here is life, here is birth, 
As falls from my spirit the grossness of earth. 

From this pause on the portal why may I not snatch 
What the long quest of ages were idle to match ; 

Tho' the prescience of poet, the babble of seer 
Have misted the glass where I fain would read clear; 

And ever arises to baffle my view, 

Some monster of Creed that hath eaten the True? 

Shall I look with mine eyes, or the eyes of dead men; 
Shall I fear for the fable, the Truth shall I ken? 



AND OTHER POEMS 119 

Yes, yes! — In the shadow which soon shall be light, 
Let me turn from the myths that have made the long night. 



Lo ! now shall they darken my chamber of life, 
While the tremulous awe of eternity rife 

Doth seize on the spirit that, passing its bourn, 
Scarce sighs a regret for the loved left to mourn. 

Past all pain of the flesh, all remorse of the soul, 

And the priest with his unction hath whispered his dole. 

For now am I shriven, and all is confessed : 
So much have I done, and to God be the rest. 

To me not the rapture of martyr or saint; 

But Heaven hath its favored — and vain the complaint. 

Speak, heart all but silent, — what gains thee this peace? 
Thou mayst not dissemble, so brief is thy lease. 

How is 't with thee, now thou art sinking to rest, 
Dismissing thy life as an unbidden guest? 

O well didst thou love it, in spite of the ill 
Thine aye in full measure — yea, loved it until 



120 YOUTH: . 

This instant there dawned the white light that on sea 
Or land ne'er hath shone — and thou long'st to be free! 

And thou, fearful soul, now so strangely at calm, 
As from the abyss there had wafted a balm, 

Soothing thy last unquiet, or, finger on lip, 
The wise god of Egypt had sued thee to sip 

Thy first taste of joy ('twas but now the Great Fear) 
Putting curb to thy speech lest a mortal should hear: — 

Dost thou see then at last by the light that none see 
And return with the tale — what was once mystery? 

The systems that men in their fantasy wrought, 

What think'st thou of them as they crumble to naught? 

And the lie of man's hope, the lie of man's fear, 
Do they fall from thee now since the answer is here; 

Or, hast thou such faith, thou must needs turn away 
From that which thou fearest thine end to betray? 

Mayhap, all too willing to forfeit the clue, 

Thou art glad to be freed from a dogma which drew 



AND OTHER POEMS 121 

A faith that was flawed and ne'er left thee at peace 
Between nature and Christ — yet would neither release. 

Had the creed of thy choice — half in fear, half in doubt 
Thou didst follow the Star — availed one more devout? 

Jesus died for all men — did He not so for thee? — 
Now thou too art dying, look up to the Tree! 

Oh, believe, if thou canst, that for thee were His moans, 
His chaplet of thorn, His sweet blood that atones. 

Thou hast wept o'er His anguish, full-hearted, and then 
Still doubted a God could have died for such men. 

No faith like to His in the gamut of creeds, 

Nor god of the soft heart, who prays and who bleeds. 

And countless are they who repose in His name: 
Some lifelong in evil, and some without blame. 

Thou mocking one, silence! — Say'st thou, " It is true, 
" Every word, of the Man-God, and like is the due 

" Of him whose believers are equal in count, 
" Gautama or Buddha — and He of the Mount 



122 YOUTH: 

" Hath as prophet and teacher no better a claim 
" Upon His led millions — for truth is the same! " 

Thou liest and seekest to bring me to loss — 
What ! Jesus no more than a rival to Joss ! 

'Tis a lie, 'tis a lie! — e'en tho' vain is that hope, 
Now that Nature hath shown what His Creed may not 
cope. 

Rabboni, Rabboni, Thou teachest aright; 

Thy word is but kindness, Thy mercy sheds light. 

Thou helpest to live and Thou helpest to die — 
But so, I am dead, and the Infinite nigh ! 

Soul, thou didst love Him — ah, tender thy grief 
O'er the sad Son of Man, yet of lovers the chief. 

Then why didst thou prove (or thyself so deceive) 
That all but His Godhead were fit to believe? — 

And lost Him ! — Yet now does the thought bring regret, 
Oh, soul, with thy face toward Eternity set? 

Nay, I read naught of doubt, and I read naught of fear, 
But a spirit that seeketh its travail to clear : — 



AND OTHER POEMS 123 

For lo ! in this moment of infinite sight, 

The life-thrall is broke and the deeps do invite ! 



Thou, soul, to such freedom wert wont to aspire, 
And the penthouse of Creed answered not thy desire. 

Full oft didst thou cry on the rankness of life — 

For e'en love hath its share — and the narrowing strife, 

The strife that the body may gain its gross need, 
Nor the spirit revolt in the toil of a Creed. 

Creed is one now with Chaos — the portal half past, 
Thou mayst smile at the things which men hug to the last. 

Beyond are the spaces: behind is the cell 
Where man and his dogma and chimera dwell. 

Son of Heaven thou wert, thy foot on the clod, 
Thy soul in the stars — go to Nature and God! 



124 YOUTH: 



THE TIME OF LOUIS THE GRAND 







FOR the time of Louis the Grand, 
The rare old time, the fine old time, 
When the world danced to the King's command, 
The Great King, the Sublime! 

When La Montespan or La Maintenon 
Held her place in the royal heart ; 

And the poet might sing, if his venal song 
Had the trick of the courtier's art. 

O the lips that lied with a perfect grace, 
And the eyes' unfathomed smile, 

The masque of powder and scent and lace, 
With its gay and gracious guile : — 

What if Honor lived as a strumpet thing, 
Yea, mocked at her patent shame, — 

Was she not the favored of court and King? — 
And the King could bear no blame! 

O the light-o'-love, the lady fair 
That did scorn one heart to gain, 

Yet yielded her sweets without a care, 
Nor seemed to know a stain : 



AND OTHER POEMS 125 

And where was the churl to say her wrong, 
Or e'en a reproach to fling, 

Since virtue to her must still belong, 
Who shared the smile of the King? 

O the perjured oaths, the broken lives, 
And the land's unheeded cry, 

The pimp or quean that in favor thrives, 
While the sinless serf must die: 

The wars which draw out the nation's blood, 
Too oft for a trivial thing — 

My faith ! such talk were not understood 
When Louis Quatorze was King. 

O the pomp and pride of the potent priest, 
Yea, the stern, un-Christlike pride 

That sate with Dives at his sinful feast, 
Nor the blackest robe could hide: 

And the barren word of his haughty dole 
To the Shepherd's chosen poor, 

Who, starved in body and mind and soul, 
Would yet their ills endure. 

O those wretched poor ! — how they bowed the head, 
And clung to their bitter lot; 

Nor ceased to pray, tho' the tears they shed 
Were of God and man forgot: — 



126 YOUTH: 

And fearful the wage that time did hold 
For the dread atoning day, 

When the serf should mock at a bribe of gold, 
And the master's blood must pay ! 

Yes, I like to think of the rare old time 
When Louis the Grand was King, 

And here am I moved to say in rhyme 
What his poets might not sing. 

The masque of powder and scent and lace, 
The court with its splendors gay, 

The sly intrigues, with their wicked grace, 
And the King's own part in the play : — 

a merry sport 'tis to make them live 
In memory's antic page ; 

And an equal justice my dream doth give 
To the King and his entourage : 

For when I wax weary and sick of heart 
At the mimic, lying scene, 

1 close mine eyes till the shades depart — 
And rises the guillotine! 



Marian: or, The Corset 



1 28 YO UTH: 



MARIAN: OR, THE CORSET 



M 



ARTAN, she is naught to me, 
And the years have swiftly sped 
Since I listened carelessly, 
When they told me she was wed : 

Cold my seeming, and the beat 
Of my pulse a tempered show-;— 

None could guess the sudden heat 
Like the lava 'neath the snow. 

I was not her lover, no ; 
Glance or sigh was ne'er for me, 

But she thought me nice, and so 
Gave me her sweet amity: — 

Soon she grew to tell me much 
(Making me her confidant) 

Kisses, vows and tears, and such 
Harmless things as maidens want. 

Dearest girl, she little dreamed, 
While she poured her artless tale 

(Cheek of rose and eyes that beamed 
Till the list'ner's sight would fail) — 



AND OTHER POEMS 129 

Little dreamed she then, I say, 
Of the pulse her charms awoke ; 

And her lip did feign alway, 
Tho' her woundless heart ne'er spoke. 

So it fared, and still she wrought 
In her perfect innocence, 

Love that grew a ceaseless thought, 
Passion that did scorn pretence. 

Slightest pressure of her hand, 
Perfume of her hair or breath, 

And her sheathed eyes' command — 
These shall not depart with death! 

Till I loved her with a love 
Hot and human to the core: — 

Let the sexless say, above, 
Crowned and blest forevermore, 

If the taste of mother earth 
Sting not sometimes on the tongue, 

Making momentary dearth 
Where eternal joy is sung! 

Marian of the marble bust, 
Marian of the glowing soul, 

'Twas not I that broke the trust, 
Love but reached his ancient goal — 



130 YOUTH: 

Fools, we dallied with the lure, 
Till it closed upon us twain — 

Mine, the pang that must endure, 
Hers, the hidden guilty stain. 

For she came one day arrayed 
In a robe of clinging lace — 

Wove with deftest skill, and bade 
So to hold in fond embrace, 

Form that needed naught from art 
To denote its faultless line — 

Gaily traced the needle's part 
And the costumer's design. 

Oh, the temptress! — had she known 
How the fire ran through my blood, 

Not so near had been her zone, 
Something she had understood: 

But alas ! she missed the flame, 
For my cheek was pale and cold — 

And a Devil quickly came 
That the sequel might be told. 

Then I said (as one who plays 
All too well an evil part) 

Her sweet form did task my praise, 
Yet a little owed to art : 



AND OTHER POEMS 131 

And the Prompter gave me word, 
Free it seemed from thought of guile, 

So that Marian, as she heard, 
Did but smile a careless smile. 

" Nay, dear maid, your shape is such 
" As Pygmalion might adore, 

" And his Galatea's touch 
" Cease to thrill forevermore: 

" Yet the binding clasp is well, 
" And it marks a charming waist, 

" Where, mayhap, were too much swell, 
" Were it not so wisely placed." 

Did she see the cunning lure 
In the idle mocking jest? 

Nay, I know not, but am sure 
Quick my hand was at her breast : 

For she dared me then to feel 
(Helping out the Devil's plot) — 

There was challenge and appeal, 
And her corset pressed her not ! 

Then with awe and ravishment 
I did leave her bosom bland, 

And the Devil still intent, 
Lower dropped my fearsome hand : 



132 YOUTH: 

Slow she yielded to my grasp, 
And her breathing sought my cheek; 

Till I felt the vestal clasp 
And the heart that fain would speak. 

Then the fire leaped up and passed 
From my swooning soul to hers: 

Love had gained his meed at last, 
Vain were sighs and soft demurs. 

Death might come and judging shame 
Curse the evil-fraughted prize; 

But the draught was still the same 
That the mirage woos and flies! 

Marian, she is naught to me, 
And the years have swiftly sped 

Since I listened carelessly, 
When they told me she was wed : 

But the past is ours to know, 
In the light of judgment set; 

Nor would I that past forego, 
With its rapture and regret. 



AND OTHER POEMS 133 



AFTER "AUX ITALIENS" 



A 



POET beyond compare?- — No, no; 
But yet has he won an envied glory, 
And passion shall ever pulse and glow 
In the lines that are linked with the Trovatore. 



For the jasmine breathes an immortal scent, 
And she who did wear it upon her breast, 

Lovely and feigning a gay content, 
Hath many a sister, were truth confessed. 

And methinks the sad Marquis of Meredith's verse 
Was not the first that did take to bed 

A lady who plighted, for better or worse, 
The heart whose love secret another had wed. 

Ah, well ! the story is aye so trite, 
'Twere not worth the pains of a thought or rhyme — 

Yet, yet, O friend, I recall a night 
When it stilled the beat of the warning chime. 



134 YOUTH: 

For late we staid in a guilty place 
Where Love and Pleasure the cup of spice 

Did press with a wild and mocking grace, 
As caught from a fallen Paradise. 

Then we gave ourselves to the headlong tide 
Of riot that knew nor let nor saw ; 

And we felt the thrill that hath been denied 
Since there came the Christ and the Christ-made law. 

'Twas worse than madness — but let that pass: 
No man may walk with an equal pace ; 

And the saint, if he study his soul's true glass, 
Shall find him a sinner, with need of grace. 

I said we were there and, the world lost, 
Did sing, laugh, dance in the way antique ; 

Nor paused to reckon the present cost, 
Nor cared what a colder hour might speak. 

So the revel went, and the wine ran red, 
As the lips of beauty quaffed and burned: 

The prophets of wrath were dumb or dead, 
And all they taught us too quick unlearned. 



AND OTHER POEMS 135 

Then a liquid girl came to my knee, 
(Her hair a Bacchantic web of gold) 

And sued with a wanton witchery, 
That the tale of love be not half told. 

Drank she in odorous gasps my breath. 
Eager the fount should unseal and flow: 

It was love and life — denial and death, 
Or the choice to my wildered sense seemed so. 

Yet coy was I to her siren charm, 
Nor might she have gained her fond desire 

(Ah, the Devil hath varied ways to harm ! ) 
Had you not arisen, with eyes of fire, — 

And read in the tones that men have thrilled, 
The poem which breathes a divine regret : — 

The warning voice in my breast was stilled, 
And her golden lashes with tears were wet. 

Then Mario with the tenor note 
That might soothe a Purgatorial pain, 

Sang clear from the donjon tower remote — 
We looked, but could only hear the refrain. 



136 YOUTH: 

And still it rose with a splendid cry, 
Then sank as tho' life would pass away, 

And, swan-like, the singer perforce must die, 
With his Non ti scordare di me, 
Non ti scordare di me! 

Yea, such was the spell of the poet's art, 
The wine and love, the girl on my knee, — 

I half arose with a sudden start, 
And gazed beyond you, as if to see — 

The lady who wore the jasmine flower, 
And held a secret the poet knew ; 

The singer within the donjon tower, 
Intoning his passionate adieu; — 

The Emperor in his box of state, 
Hearing but dully the wondrous strain ; 

And she who partnered his crown and fate, 
With her heart aglow for Spain. 

Ah, well might she when her world of glass 
Like a bauble broke in the evil day, 

Cry out to the nations that sighed " Alas! " — 
Non ti scordare di me, 

Non ti scordare di me ! 



AND OTHER POEMS 137 

Still on you read while she held me close, 
And drew the spirit from out mine eyes; 

Her petalled breast like a pulsing rose — 
And the need that ever the soul defies. 

What after passed I may not confess, — 
Such joy doth leave an abiding shame: 

But, friend, I hold for my guilty stress, 
The Devil, the poet and you to blame ! 

And the golden girl who sat on my knee 
(With lovers alas ! how many a score) 

Mayhap, the spell of that minstrelsy 
Shall haunt her bosom forevermore. 

'Twere much to think, for such love and wine 
Fill up her life's delirious round ; 

Yet may she recall a night divine 
When love the poet's own philter found. 

And, perchance — tho' a social death divide, 
And a wild remorse that shall never die — 

The purer love to her life denied 
May voice the tender, appealing cry 



138 YOUTH: 

That rang from the donjon tower remote, 
And the lady heeded with aspect gay, 

While her soul did swoon in the thrilling^note 
Of Non ti sc or dare di me, 

Non ti scordare di me ! 



M 



AND OTHER POEMS 139 



MARGIE 

ARGIE, Margie ! your sad face lives in'memory, 
A haunting, guilty memory, 
Yet sweeter oft than it should be : — 
For scarlet was the robe you wore, 
Tho' as a vestal put to shame 

By some mischance — I loved you more 
Because I might not blame. 

Margie, Margie! say not such love was mockery, 

A lustful, soulless mockery, 

Since other men had love as free. 

Oh, truth of devils! — well, 'tis just, 
For love is not a thing profaned ; 

And he who seeks his love in lust, 
Her image hath distained. 

Margie, Margie ! my spirit pleads 'gainst this decree ; 

This cruel tho' condign decree 

Was never writ for you and me. 

I wept to find among the lost 
One of such mien, such brow of light — 

As Heaven were moved to pay the cost, 
That Hell might view its blight! 



14° YOUTH: 

Margie, Margie ! thro' all the count of years that be 

The years of self-control that be 

'Twixt that far guilty hour and me, — 

I see the lighted, splendid room 
Where Sin did make her trysting place ; 

I taste the bagnio's gross perfume, 
I see your tragic face. 

Margie, Margie! had I but sought the spell to free, 

Yea, turned with instant step to flee, 

Surcease had come to memory. 

But no! — Tho' not as grosser men, 
I gave you of my love and tears, 

And spoke of rescue — there and then, 
My coward self appears. 

Margie, Margie! such love as ours is ill to see, 

A fearful thing, an upas tree 

Blasting the vale of memory. 

I loved you, but I might not save, 
And you, so like to the elect, 

Did point unto a shamed grave, 
And my weak vow reject! 

Margie, Margie ! we parted — for eternity ! 
God's faith, a blest eternity 
That shall annul the past for me. 



AND OTHER POEMS 141 

I would forget your haunting face, 
The tragic pathos of your eyes, 

The gross perfume, the sinful place, 
The worm that never dies. 

Margie, Margie! peace unto you, peace unto me; 
But peace to you, tho' pain to me, 
Thro' all the dateless lapse to be: — 
Mine be the hope that Heaven ere now 

Hath wiped your grief and stain away, 
And lit the glory of that brow 

Which showed a seraph — but astray! 



142 YOUTH: 



CATHERINE OF RUSSIA 



I'VE been thinking about Catherine the Second, 
Who is reckoned 
A lady of exceeding parts, 
A queen of realms and eke of hearts ; 
To whom the world a merry debt 
Of lusty love is paying yet. 
And since that royalty pretends 
The right divine with virtue blends, 
A doubting world to honest Kate 
May leave the issue at debate. 



For that she honest was, I'll stake my reading; 

Altho' her breeding 
Might show a fault, mayhap a vice ; 
And sure the age was not so nice 
But persons of august degree 
(Like some to-day) in morals free 
Might e'en appear — but that's a trifle, 
Nor should it serve a jot to rifle 
(Else would not I be holding forth) 
Of her great fame and boundless worth. 



AND OTHER POEMS 143 

'Twere surely wrong in malice to defeat her, 

Since lousy Peter 
(Of course, 1 mean him dubbed the Great) 
Was very near her royal date, 
And left her a barbaric state ; 
A court where manners ne'er did trench 
Till came the suave, lascivious French, 
And fixed their own immoral code 
Upon the rude Slavonic mode ; 
And showed them divers things to do, 
Besides the trick of fiarlez vous. 

But there's a tale which I am loth to credit, 

Tho', having read it, 
In chronicles of grave repute, 
'Twere not so easy to confute : 
How Catherine a vulgar strain 
Evinced when love did give the rein, 
And might not then be satisfied 
(I wish the shame could be denied) 
Till sov'reignty were laid aside ; 
Nor hide — tho' Gallic wits lampooned — 
Her royal will to be dragooned. 

Well, what of that? — as much hath scandal hinted, 

And even printed, 
Of her, the "Vestal of the West," 



144 YOUTH: 

Who lived a virgin (self-confessed), 
Yet did a passing fondness show 
For proper men — and felt a glow 
For Essex, if the tale be true, 
Which he on scaffold sore did rue ; 
Since her fierce spleen might not abate, 
But left him to his hapless fate. 



A tiger's heart had she, old Harry's daughter, 

And they who sought her, 
Or else were sought, in wanton mood — 
For ne'er was maiden so endued 
With that which bears a grosser shame 
Than History would dare to name — 
Did find too soon the fickle jade 
Waxed cruel, while the sport she made ; 
And held a bitter thank in trust 
For the last chosen of her lust. 



Of gentler clay the lady of my praising, 

Tho' quite amazing 
In point of wanton fickleness; — 
Yet knew not how to work distress 
In them who, finding favor gone, 
Might think to fear the changed one. 



AND OTHER POEMS 145 

Nay, tho' the story's past astounding, 
For them her grace was aye abounding; 
Her kindness flowed, her bounteous hand 
Was quick to soothe as to command. 

And, if the flame were some plebeian -ouski, 

1 Mayhap, or -grouskz, 
Who by his inches and his mien 
Had gained the favor of the Queen, 
And been elected to the bliss 
Of her ennobling clasp and kiss; — 
Be sure that she, ashamed to own 
A love discourteous to the throne, 
Would yet attend to his promotion, 
And well repay a night's devotion. 



I own this trait on me hath made impression 

Of long possession ; 
And I could wish a better lot 
Were hers, — to be of men forgot, 
Nor her hot sins in each new age 
The prurient spirit to engage : — 
That she but one true heart had known, 
Nor ever mounted to a throne; 
Nor joy less pure had e'er confessed 
Than when love's babe did milk her breast. 



146 YOUTH: 

Howbeit, there's no help for what is written ; 

And, tho' I'm smitten 
With certain kindliness of Kate, 
And wish naught worse were to relate, — 
Yet, yet it must in truth be owned, 
Tho' her warm heart for much atoned 
(And then the Russian morals, too, 
A circumstance we can't eschew) — 
Her story hath such varied shame, 
That they who love her needs must blame. 



The Legend of Jesus of Mexico 



YOUTH: 



JESUS OF MEXICO 



9 'TpIS said that in old Mexico 

1 They christen every Mestizo 
(Who is not named Jose or Juan) 
After the sinless Son of Man. 

Whence is the custom none can say, 
But all know 'twas an evil day 
The padres did the curse bestow, 
And Jesus came of Mexico. 

The padres are a scurvy lot, 
Nor grace nor linen have they got; 
Of learning such a scanty siege 
As scarce to smell a sacrilege. 

You see them in the Mexic sun, 
Round-bellied, greasy, every one : 
And, for your life, you can't say nay 
To hints from sly old Rabelais. 



AND OTHER POEMS 149 

And then there comes upon the breeze 
The odor of their sanctities ; 
And you shall make yourself acquaint 
How soap, as ever, shuns the saint. 

But 'tis not now my private aim 
Upon the cloth to cast a shame; 
And if it were, I need not go, 
Perchance, as far as Mexico. 

Be sure the padres mean no wrong, 
But they have done the thing so long, 
'Tis most unmeet they now should see 
The fruit of their impiety: — 

A ghastly fruit for all to see, 
That burthens many a Texan tree ; 
Whence smell and curse of death do blow 
O'er many a league of Mexico. 

For, strangest tale is mine to tell, 
Nor ever babe this boon befell 
But grew to scoff at law and order, 
And eke to rustle* o'er the border. 



* To " rustle " is to steal cattle in western parlance. 



150 YOUTH: 

In vain the padre's prayers arise 
For him who sees the horned prize, 
And waits, till cowboy rides afar, 
The round-up's symmetry to mar. 

Then men with sweeping sombrero 
Swift o'er the bounding prairie go ; 
With mustang or with lithe burro, 
And lariat ready for the throw : — 

Until they sight his guilty trail ; 
Then fiercely do they curse and rail, 
And dash the rowel in the steed, 
And pray on him to get a bead. 

Far, far and wide the plain extends, 
Nor rock nor tree the wretch befriends, 
Who madly lets his plunder go, 
And strikes a gait for Mexico. 

But lo! the hunters speed amain, 
And, flinging loose his bridle rein, 
The Mexic man unloads a shot, 
And one pursuer now is not. 



AND OTHER POEMS 151 

Too late to save! — One last wild spurt, 
And then a bullet, whizzing curt 
Beside his ear, shall bring to bay 
The Mexic man, the Texans' prey. 

-#> 
'Tis thus, with rope at saddle bow, 
They'd Jesus hunt of Mexico; 
And when they'd got him, shortest shrift 
Would mark his dire baptismal gift. 

And he, poor man, too well would know 
To beg were vain from such a foe ; 
Tho' some regret for Mexico 
Might mingle with his stoic show. 

But chief would be his final plan 
To die as fits a Mexican : 
Nor would he even plead his name, 
A moment's grace or ease to claim. 

They'd bring him to a neat chaparral, 
And there, lest justice make a quarrel, 
Condemn to death, with briefest show, 
Him Jesus called of Mexico. 



152 YOUTH: 

They'd hang him to a likely tree, 
Without one thought of Calvary ; 
And leave him, long-haired, rigid, there, 
Minus the formula of prayer. 

Perchance, in sacrilegious mood, 
They'd fix upon his gallows rood, 
In lieu of epitaph, a scrawl 
Declaring in these terms to all : 

" Hyar Jesus hangs of Mexico — 

" Ten head he got — the rest ye know. 

" Did he not cattle steal below, 

" No man might have a fairer show. 

" This hyar's to certify to sich 
" As wants too quick to git 'em rich, 
" They're bound at last their luck to throw, 
" And swing like J. of Mexico." 
-*> 
O Christ! a fearsome thing to see, 
The wretch bemocked with name of Thee: 
His eyes wide-staring, void of hope, 
And round his neck the clutching rope. 



AND OTHER POEMS 153 

The buzzard fierce, the carrion crow 
Would Jesus scent of Mexico; 
And feed his healthy flesh upon 
Till there was left a skeleton. 

Then late would come the gaunt coyote, 
And, finding yet his meal remote, 
Send shrilling o'er the desert plain 
His cry, like soul in penal pain. 

Thro' hollow ribs the winds would go, 
Lamenting him of Mexico, 
Who might in bed have snugly died, 
Had but the priest that curse denied. 

-•> 
And naught avails to check the fate 
That still the race doth decimate: 
The singing lead, the lariat's play 
No hint of wrath divine convey. 

Nor will the padres aye confess 
Their wisdom or their saintship less, 
While but remains one greasy fee 
To mock the God of Calvary! 



154 YOUTH: 

'Tis thus that in old Mexico 
You'll find that many a Mestizo 
(Who is not Jose, neither Juan) 
Doth call himself the Son of Man. 

Thus cowboy, coyote, buzzard, crow, 
On trail of him Christ-cursed go ; 
And when they get him, all men know 
How Jesus dies of Mexico. 



AND OTHER POEMS 155 



A STAGE PICTURE 



IN the lime light, in the air 
Warm with woman's perfume there, 
(Redolent of other things 
Than the classic fancy brings) 
Leaped a vision on my sight, 
That annulled the present quite; 
Led me back to elder Greece, 
Perfect beauty, perfect peace. 

'Twas Aurora, shrinking maid, 
Of the sun's first kiss afraid; 
With her bosom coyly turned, 
Till the ardent lover burned; 
And her nakedness divine, 
Symphony of curve and line, 
Urging on the god's emprise, 
While the Night in terror flies. 

Swift and fervid is the suit, 
Every heart intent and mute. 
Now the timid maid is drawn 
Past the chill door of the Dawn : 



156 YOUTH: 



And she fain would shyly look, 
Could her eyes the splendor brook 
Psyche once was tempted so — 
Why should she a peep forego? 

Ah, what will not woman dare ! 
Now in fullest glory there, 
See, she opens wide her eyes 
In a glance of rapt surprise : 
Ere her dazzled lids may close, 
Lo! she fades — and with a pose, 
Graceful as a dying swan, 
Shows the passing of the Dawn. 



To My Wife 



158 YOUTH: 



T 



TO MY WIFE 



HO' the vision and the music of the poet be denied 
To the darkling soul, the ear unto a grosser 
cadence tied ; 



Tho' the line be crude and halting and the thought of 

little worth, 
And the farthest flight of fancy never leave the leaden 

earth — 

Still may you to such endeavor ear and soul and fancy 

move, — 
Tho' the world look on with scorning, 'tis enough that 

you approve. 

Love hath made me your dear poet, — well I know the 

highest strain 
Of the age-enthroned singer might address your heart 

in vain. 

Tho' the laurel never flourished that shall crown this 

brow of mine, 
And my toilsome thought and travail yield me but a 

barren vine: 



AND OTHER POEMS 159 

Tho' 'twere better to give over all the stress and trial 

sore, 
Since a narrow fate against me ever keeps the golden 

door; 

And my knocking oft repeated soundeth back upon my 

heart 
With a hollow echo, telling of the poet's empty part : — 

Yet since you do sit beside me, I may not forego the 

prize 
Ever shining in the lucent light of love's untroubled 

eyes. 

And, mayhap, since fame is at the best no better than a 

dream, 
Holding but a barren promise and an ever fickle 

theme; — 

I may turn me from the rhyming crowd that fills the 

common mart, 
With a rage for gain unseemly and a huckster cry of 

art; 

Turn me to the light serener than e'er came from sun or 

star, 
To the faith that never falters, to the glory where you 

are! 



160 YOUTH: 

I will sing for you, you only, let the world go wag its 

way, 
And the critic with his little spite beguile his little day. 

Peace and rest were ne'er my portion, — these I cannot 

hope to win, 
Yet the spider in the whirring wheel may chance a web 

to spin. 

So may I, amid the hunted care and labor of my life, 
Snatch a theme from out of travail and a sweetness out 
of strife. 

You will read it to our children when, perchance, my 

day is done — 
Say me wrong if ever poet hath a rarer laurel won ; — 

In the quiet hours and tender when the lamp its cheerful 

ray 
Sheds upon the little circle, resting then from task and 

play. 

And the boy, — our first and noblest, whom his father 

might not show 
All the love he gave unto him, such as child can never 

know ; — 



AND OTHER POEMS 161 

I do see him, sitting gravely, with the light on brow and 

hair; 
In his crescive youth fulfilling all his childhood's promise 

fair. 

Oh, the sweet and solemn vision refts my heart with 

keenest pain, 
And the tears do fall and blind me ere I well can look 

again. 

Yes, I see him as he hearkens to his mother's gentle 

voice, — 
First of all my household darlings, if my heart must 

have a choice. 

Moulded with a kinder purpose, fashioned to a gentler 

truth 
Than the dreary scheme of saving that did desolate my 

youth. 

He by love's own tender guidance shall be led apart from 

ill;- 
Not with means that call a challenge to the early force 

of will. 

Loving as I loved, but holding self in check with firmer 

rein; 
Master of his strongest passion, higher than his grosser 

strain : 



1 62 YOUTH: 

Hating with his father's hatred, scorning with his father's 

scorn, 
Tho' a golden fortune offer if his truth he will suborn. 

Thus I view him, love and duty shining out from his 

young face, 
Hope and leader of the household, filling well his father's 

place ; 

With the rest (as now I fancied) by the cheerful lamp 

and fire, 
While the mother seeks her solace in the sad and broken 

lyre. 

In such holy time and peaceful, what might not my 

spirit dare? — 
Yea, to viewless come amidst you and resume my vacant 

chair: 

Spread my hands in benediction on the loved ones of my 

soul — 
Poet, Father watching o'er you till you join him at the 

goal! 



AND OTHER POEMS 163 



WILT THOU FORGET WITH 
ADDING YEARS 



w 1 



ILT thou forget with adding years 
And babes new-springing at thy knee, 
The first and holiest mystery 

That drew our praise, our joy and tears? 



Too long the pregnant cycle seemed 
To hope that might not brook delay; 
Impatient of the lagging day 

When love's first pledge should be redeemed. 

Yet steeds by day and steeds by night 
Were bearing swift our wished-for joy; 
And Nature at her old employ 

Did act the timid neophyte. 



1 64 YOUTH: 

Then came — when half our hope we feared 
Had lapsed unto a sad escheat — 
A sudden message thrilling sweet, 

And life and love as one appeared ! 

For lo ! the babe behind the veil, 
As seeming doubt to understand, 
Leaped up within the Forming Hand : 

And faith and hope no more might fail. 



AND OTHER POEMS 165 



THE QUARREL 

DEAR one, there was a cruel day 
(Nor hath its sorrow faded yet) 
When we forgot the vow, the debt 
Of wedded love, to love alway. 

A sudden anger fiercely flamed, 

A winged word of killing scorn ; 
Then Love fled far and Hate was born - 

Nor matters it who wrongly blamed. 

Yes, Hate! — for 'tis a wisdom old 

That love's extreme shall come to this ; 
And lips which now but leaned to kiss, 

Will soon another tale have told. 

A passing madness — were't to last, 

The Furies then might rule content; 
And all the sweet of life were spent, 

And all the devils inward cast. 



1 66 YOUTH: 

But never was it writ that Love 

Might not resume his hearted reign ; 
Or send as messenger in vain, 

His snow-white, olive-bearing dove. 

He strikes his harp, whose golden strings 

Lay mute or gave a troubled strain — 
And lo ! the charm is his again ; 

Tho' here and there a tear he flings. 

O magic tears! — do they not speak 

What love uncrossed might never say: 
Of doubt and sorrow cleared away, 

Of darling Hope, serene and meek ; — 

Of love that found in loss its gain, 

And wisdom in the lesson learned, 
The deeper truth of life discerned, 

The tempered pulse, the judgment sane? 

Such, dear one, is the sadd'ning truth 

That we, mayhap, too early proved ; 
When rather then our souls behooved 

The shadeless joy of wedded youth. 



AND OTHER POEMS 167 

But still it comes to youth and age, 

And better that we learn it soon, 
When life and love are at the noon : 

The dusk shall other care engage. 

So think I now, but not so then, 

On that far day whose cruel mark 
Shines livid out, tho' much is dark 

In years of nearer, calmer ken. 

Alas ! it seemed that naught might heal 

The breach which came our souls between ; 
And each did loathe for what had been, 

And what no future hour should feel. 

Yes, Love was dead, and we stood by, 

So near our hands and lips might touch — 
Nor seas could sunder half so much 

Your heart from mine, or, eye from eye. 

Thus, mute and sullen, still we staid 

Till, all-reluctant, came old Time, 
Prepared the knell of Love to chime, 

And eke to use his sexton spade. 



1 68 YOUTH: 

In pity at the pallid boy 

He threw a glance: then sadly gave 
His strength to form the shallow grave, 

As one constrained to his employ. 

Then had I spoke, but 'tis the curse 
Of love estranged to set a seal 
On lips that fain would make appeal, 

And tender penitence rehearse. 

Full soon he turned the clod away, 

And stooped to lay poor Love within — 
I took one step — as if to win 

The little corpse from out the clay. 

You trembled, as of grief beguiled, 

And vainly sought a tear to hide : 
The gentle sexton turned aside, 

And lo! the boy awoke and smiled. 

O joy that pain and strife impart ! 

O sweet that springs from bitter fruit ! 

Nor tongue may tell the rapture mute 
When there I caught you to my heart. 



AND OTHER POEMS 169 

So passed the cloud, and clear the day 

Hath shone aye since for me and you: — 
The wise old sexton also knew, 

And took his spade and shroud away. 



1 70 YO UTH, 



THE AWAKENING 



THERE comes an hour, there comes an 
hour, 
The deepest dark and dawn between, 
When falls upon the soul, I ween, 

The shadow of a mystic power. 



For Love and Life do sadly wane, 
As blown upon by wind of death; 
And, with the seeming lapse of breath, 

The soul her freedom shall regain. 



Bright shone my home with lamp and fire, 
A loving wife and children fair; 
And peace and sweet content were there, 

Nor one unsatisfied desire. 



AND OTHER POEMS 171 

And she, the youngest, on my knee, 
With clust'ring hair and cherub face, 
Did woo me with a soft embrace, 

While rose her brothers' noisy glee : — 

Until I dreamed of that far day 
When first I held her mother so: 
Ah, tender eyes, whose constant glow 

Hath cheered my toil and shown the way! 

And still do light my heart and home 
With ray that ever seems to bless, 
And heal the hurt and calm the stress, 

When from the guiding ark I roam. 

Sweet eyes, that evil chance do cope, 
Dear heart, that beats alone for me : 
And lo! the babe upon my knee 

Reflects the blessing and the hope. 
-*> 

Now do I seek my couch of rest; 
The lights are low, the babes are warm : 
The mother prays to shield from harm 

These ne'er by human fear oppressed. 



172 YOUTH: 

And sleep comes down, as falls the fleece, 
Till brooding murmurs die away; 
And angel guards their hest obey 

To keep the household's holy peace. 

All hushed and still: e'en I do share 
Some portion of the perfect calm : — 
The thought of God descends like balm 

Upon the sinner and his care. 

A mighty rising in the night, 
As of some strong-winged wind of Death 
O'ercoming every human breath 

With awful and resistless blight. 

And lo! my dreamless sleep is o'er, 
Tho' 'tis the soul alone awakes, 
As 'twere the angel's trump that shakes, 

And Life and Love were now no more! 

Oh, House of Life, thy walls are laid, 
Thy sacred places opened wide 
To the all-drowning lethal tide, 

And I must view the ruin made: — 



AND OTHER POEMS 173 

Must view and still return, as one 
Condemned unto a spectre quest; 
Bereft of hope and seeking rest 

Till aeons mark its penance done. 

Oh, heart, what is thy swooning fear? 
Oh, soul, is this the moment then 
Which opes to thee a larger ken, 

With clay unclogged, a purer sphere? 

And art thou now content to leave 
This cherished altar of thy love; 
A shrine where doubtings never strove 

Against the truths which still bereave 

Of that old Faith which lulled to sleep 
Those countless, holding hope in Christ, — 
But fabled fears were sacrificed 

That Love his perfect rule might keep? 
-#> 

Not yet, not yet ! — • A little cry 
That strangely seemeth passing far 
(As from an isle of hope, or star, 

Some voice did speak of succor nigh) — 



174 YOUTH: 

A little cry that makes for me 
Across the darkness of the night; 
A baby fear that asks the light 

And ends the father's agony. 

I shake the lethal horror off, 
I wipe the cold sweat from my brow; 
But there is that within, I trow, 

Which freest sunshine shall not doff. 

Chill is the air, and now the fire, 
As dying with the night's extreme 
(A sullen likeness to my dream) 

Doth in its own pale ash expire. 



AND OTHER POEMS 175 



CHILD CARE AND HEART CARE 



CHILD care and heart care, 
These are now thine, 
Thou, whose dear life was pledged 
Early to mine. 

Hourly a sacrifice 
I may not pay : 

God keeps the reckoning 
For His own day. 



All that thou askest, 
A look, a caress; 

Joy is thy portion 
To serve and to bless. 

Day comes and night comes, 
Ever the same; 

Love in thy loving heart 
Feeds the pure flame. 



176 YOUTH. 



Oft in the silent hours 
Wake I alone 

To ponder the marvel 
His mercy hath shown. 

Graceless and dark of soul 
Tho' I may be, 

A saint at my hearthstone 
Is praying for me. 



Oh, if the faults that were 
Born with my blood 

Work thee unkindness, 
Who only art good, — 

Grieve not, beloved one, 
Nor then think me changed : 

Lo, if thy love revolt, 
God is estranged! 



Sinful and selfish I, 
Greater thy meed, 

And blessed the guerdon 
For thee and thy seed. 



AND OTHER POEMS 177 

Love and all goodness flow 
From thy soft breast; 

Happy the infant there 
Lulling to rest! 



Child care and heart care, 
These are now thine; 

Still doth thy loyal soul 
Duty divine: — 

Duty that lightens 
Thy life's simple round, 

Till sorrow and toil done, 
Thy glory be found! 



178 YOUTH: 



HERE IS MY HAVEN 



H 



ERE is my haven, here my place 
Of rest secure, of tranquil thought; 
The home thou makest where thy face 
Its daily task of joy hath wrought. 



Too well I know the debt is mine, — 
Thy life and love, thy hearted care, 

The fruitful bearing breast of thine, 
The chains of love which thou must wear. 

Never, oh, never may I hope 
To quit the long and patient score; 

Thy tenderness and truth to cope, 
Which rise for me in endless store. 

Nor wouldst thou have it so, for love 
Like thine lives but in sacrifice, 

And thou must serve thy truth to prove, 
Else, as a vine some hand unties, 



AND OTHER POEMS 179 

Thy tender function comes to naught, 
Its source of nurture rudely reft, 

Its timid ministry unsought, 
And only death the solace left. 

Sweet soul, it were an idle fear, — 
Nor may it haunt thy gentle breast: 

Thy love and service twinned appear, 
And God will answer for the rest. 



180 YOUTH: 



THY GUERDON 



T 



HOU hast bled for me, hast shed for me 
The rarest, deepest tears; 
Thou hast smiled with perfect courage 
At Death and all his fears, — 

In the sad time, yet the glad time 
When a little life was nigh, 

And thy pain did turn to rapture 
With our infant's borning cry. 



'Twere no measure for the treasure 
That I all unworthy wear, 

In the joy thy love hath given, 
And the cross it still must bear, — 

Thus to bring thee, thus to sing thee, 
Verses from my loving heart, 

Vainly seeking for the secret 
Which no poet might impart. 



AND OTHER POEMS 181 

Deep indwelling voice is telling, 
Fadeless guerdon waits thee now: — 

Tender soul, thou mayst not wear it, 
Till the peace is on thy brow. 

Tho' I share not, yet I care not 
Howso dark my portion be, 

If my soul behold the vision, 
If thy glory I may see ! 



1 82 YOUTH: 



OH,LIFE AND LOVE,HOW SORDID YOU 



o 



H, Life and Love, how sordid you 
To jaded soul and sense appear; 
As in the saddened yellow year 

The skies forget their cheerful hue. 



No heart so faithful but it knows 
The fading of the first fond dream ; 
E'en tho' a smiling joy would seem 

To hide the lack that ever grows. 

Dear love, e'en such may we confess 
And wisdom gather from the pain, 
The marring of the magic strain 

That once our souls did wildly^bless. 

So come the vision calm and clear, 
The equal poise of heart and brain ; 
The grosser self subdued, the plane 

Of love's serener atmosphere. 



AND OTHER POEMS 183 

Then fitted we to mould the lives 
Which God hath trusted to our care ; 
For in such chastened, stormless air 

The household plant of duty thrives. 

And if the gain seem cruel loss, 
As in the gray we mourn the gold, — 
The dream shall bless an hundred fold 

When Love hath laid aside his cross ! 



1 84 YOUTH: 



THY FAITH 

HERE is no faith but has its doubt, 
Save that which fills thy gentle breast : 
The thought of God to thee is rest, 

And Life and Love were names without. 



T 



Thou knowest not why — it is enough, 
Thy placid being sees its hope 
A steadfast light, nor thine to cope 

The long, long quest, the wrestling rough : 

The vigil that shall little yield 
When all is gained and all denied : 
A sickened soul, a barren pride, 

A doubt that doubting holds the field. 

The babe thou foldest in thine arms 
Hath such content of soul as thou 
Who turnest thine unasking brow 

From aught that perfect peace alarms. 



AND OTHER POEMS 185 

Would that my faith were like to thine, 
E'en as the same our earthly lot, — 
For, if truth be where thou art not, 

Vain shall I seek the clew divine. 



13 



1 86 YOUTH: 



THE NIGHT I LED YOU HOME 



THE night I led you home, my dear, 
The night I led you home, 
When rite and ring our joy did bring — 
The self-same path to roam : 

When love no more might trouble sore 
With cross or cold delay, 

And winds were hushed as sweetly blushed 
The bride upon her way. 

The nuptial kiss you gave me, dear, 
When we two were alone, 

And I had ta'en your kiss again, 
And peace was all our own : 

The tender thrill is with me still, 
And may it linger yet — 

Oh, vanished years! oh, silent tears! 
What is't that you regret? 

Your shy sweet smile at morn, my dear, 
When crept you to my breast, 

And hid the face where love might trace 
A maiden's all confessed : — 



AND OTHER POEMS 187 

The tender ray then fled away 
Where fadeless treasures be; — 

Yet, when our babe her first smile gave, 
The light came back to me. 

Your patient trust and love, my dear, 
Unworthy I to win, 

But hope so brave at last may save 
The sinner from his sin. 

Ah, well know I were death now nigh, 
'Twould bring no victory, 

Should one sweet soul the blessed goal 
Find all unshared by me. 

Dear gentle heart, that aye forgives 
What I may not atone, 

Tho' faith be strong and grace be long, 
And God still waits his own, — 

Bear with me yet till nature's debt 
Shall close the space to roam ; 

And you shall lead me home, my dear, 
And you shall lead me home! 



1 88 YOUTH: 



SON OF MY YOUTH 

SON of my youth, in thee renews 
The hope forespent, the brighter dream 
That once was mine: — I kiss the dews 
Of morning in thine eyes' clear gleam ; 

And strive with anxious heart to read 
The page as yet unoped to thee 

Whom angel hands attendant lead 
Thro' childhood's holy mystery. 

Had I a prophet's voice to speak 
Of that a father's love would spare, 

Should sin and shame still mar the cheek 
Upraised with all promise fair? 

And those sweet eyes whose depths so pure 
Shine as the ray of Eden shone, — 

Should they see on and life endure 
When light of God and hope is gone? 



AND OTHER POEMS 189 

Child of my soul, could I avert 
What Wisdom warns and Youth denies 

Till, all the springs of life inert, 
Comes cankered Age as Folly flies, — 

Should I the talismanic word 
Then boldly speak for love of thee, 

That thou mightst walk, unseen, unheard 
Of every evil destiny; 

Still wearing on thy brow the look 
Which Eden's blest alone may share 

With them whose garments may not brook 
The soiling touch of mortal air; 

Virgin of heart, nor knowing sin, 
Nor e'en its thought thy peace to mar: 

Such calm without, such grace within, 
Self-centred, like a lonely star: — 

Ah, Gerald, should thy father say 
The word to bring such boon to thee, 

That thou mightst walk a thornless way 
To reap unconscious victory? 



J 9° YOUTH 

No! by the all-atoning rood, 
The blood-marked steep, the stripes and crown, 

The sacred pledge for ill subdued, 
The sin that drew a Saviour down: — 

Thine rather be the lot ordained 
Of all who hold the Christ-born hope; 

To fall with every vantage gained, 
To rise in light, in dark to grope: — 

To feel that He, the Saving One, 
Doth seem to turn His glance away; 

Yet, when sweet penitence is done, 
Again to know the blessed ray: — 

Thy soul to prove and ne'er to lose 
The careful count of all thy years, 

That of the sum none may refuse 
The spirit's toil, the spirit's tears; 

With growing age a growing cross, 
A heart true-tempered in the strife; 

Careless alike of gain and loss 
So truth be one with all thy life. 



AND OTHER POEMS 191 

Such would I have thee, tender boy, 
E'en tho' I tremble at the hour 

(Thank God, still far!) when love's employ- 
Shall be to wait thy proved power: 

And I shall sit with folded hands, 
Dumb waiting at my silent hearth; 

As one who dully understands 
His aching bosom's woeful dearth. 

Grant Thou, O Arbiter of all, 
That he may pass his trial well, 

And my dim age hear not the call 
Unto the Conquered Citadel ! 



192 YOUTH: 



UNBORN 



w 



'HEN wilt thou come from thy mystic 
place 
To glad thy mother's heart and mine? 

Babe of our love, why lingerest thou 
Till the cherished hope decline? 

Thy mother is wan with waiting long; 
Fear and awe do her care divide : 

A home is made in our souls for thee, 
And for aye thou shalt abide. 

Enter thou into thy royal right, 
Slaves are we to thy baby hest : 

Thy throne is ready, thy kingdom safe! — 
Sigh we still for the bidden guest. 

Wilt thou not come from the mystic place 
To glad thy mother's heart and mine? 

Child of our love, still lingerest thou 
Till the cherished hope decline. 



AND OTHER POEMS 193 



HOME I CAME AND THOU WERT 
WAITING 



H 



OME I came and thou wert waiting, 
Little thou hadst to say to me ; 
Deep in thy heart was Love relating 
The wondrous story soon to be, 

When he should ope his mystery. 

Again I came to meet thy greeting, 
And lo! I sank unto my knee; 

For, whiter than thy nuptial sheeting, 
Thou didst not need to speak to me — 

Oh, no, my love, might I not see! 

But now I come when dusk is falling, 
With quickened step across the lea; 

A little voice is sweetly calling, 
And two there are who wait for me: — 

Bless God, dear heart, that this may be! 



194 YOUTH: 



THE LOVE WHICH NE'ER A CROSS 

HATH KNOWN 



T 



HE love which ne'er a cross hath known 
Is not a love for me : 
The heart which holdeth bliss alone, 
The sunlight with no shadow thrown, 
The tideless, restful sea, — 

From these my spirit turns away, 

As dreams that fade with common day. 

But give to me the love which bears 

A mingled joy and pain ; 

The heart that in its service wears 
A smiling calm, nor e'en despairs 

When storms do shake the main ; — 

The path oft closed by sorrow's night, 
Yet working out its way to light. 

Then may I rise and gird me on 
Mine armor for the fray ; 

And thou shalt wait thy love upon, 

With hope and tender orison, 
Still thwarting grim Dismay: — 

Thy kiss to keep my soul from harm, 

Thy truth to brace my fighting arm. 



AND OTHER POEMS 195 



UNWORTHY 



SOMETIMES I mark thee in thy gentlest mood, 
With pensive air and eyes wherein thy soul 
Doth show as in the wave a shining star; 
And thy rapt glance bespeaks a farther ken 
Than my gross spirit dares, that finds the goal 
Set by the passions and the lusts of men; 
Nor e'er may hope to clear the mortal bar, 
And win, like thee, a heavenly interlude. 



Oh, then the blighting fear comes o'er my heart 
That thou, too good to share my earthly lot, 
And blessing it beyond all meed of praise, 
Must in the spirit kingdom sighing see 
Him whom thou lovest share thy glory not, 
Or but as one far, far removed from thee; 
And haunted with the sweet old human days 
When love's one strain was that we ne'er should part. 



196 YOUTH: 



WERE I A BARD WITH ROSES 
CROWNED 

WERE I a bard with roses crowned 
The world mayhap should hear a song 
High-raised from the jingling throng 
That now the poet name confound. 

Unmindful I of other aim 
Than but a glad, calm theme to choose 

With simplest measures, as became 
The reed pipe of the elder muse. 

Alas, the poet's world is reft 
Of all that made the golden note, 
Which coldly falls on ears remote, 

With not one nymph or naiad left. 

And I who dream of that far day, 
And vainly sigh for myrtled ease, 
For careless fauns and dryades, 

May put the foolish dream away. 



AND OTHER POEMS 197 

So let me sing, if sing I must, 
With thorned wreath of daily care : 
'Twere not unmeet a bard to wear, 

And rose and thorn alike are dust. 

Yet, yet did roses crown my brow, 
Might I with Pan contest the prize, 

And pipe full clear the strain that now 
Within my bosom droops and dies. 



198 YOUTH: 



D 



A PRAYER 



EAR God! I may not pray to Thee, 
As churchmen bid me pray, 
From holy book on bended knee, 
At mass or vesper say: — 

Yet far from me to raise a gibe 
At psalm or sacred rite; 

Nor am I of the hapless tribe 
That will not see Thy light. 



Need I to go unto Thy shrine 
The pillared aisles among, 

When here within this soul of mine 
Thy fear or praise hath tongue? 

Why should I seek in crowded fane 
What still with me abides, 

Nor e'er will leave this breast again 
Till earth the mansion hides? 



AND OTHER POEMS 199 

Oh, Spirit Dweller of my soul, 
Thy altar still is here; 

Nor needs a priest, with cross or stole, 
My troubled breast to clear. 

If I but cast away my sin, 
And, seeking, find Thy grace, 

Shall not Thy holy peace begin 
Ere I may see Thy face? 



Thou knowest how dark is my estate, 
How weak and prone to ill 

This human heart — how strong the fate 
Which holds it captive still ; 

The hands that made me ere my birth, 
The hands that after marred, 

The wiles that walk my way of earth, 
My fortune evil-starred. 



To Thee my soul's most secret place 
An open page appears; 

The sin that I with pain do trace, 
Thy judging vision clears. 



YO UTH: 

What need to say to mortal ear 
The thing I tell to Thee, — 

Nay, wherefore speak, since Thou wilt hear 
The soul's mute implory? 



Thou, Holy Spirit, Thou shalt shrive 
The sinner of his sin, — 

Yea, tho' the Sons of Darkness drive 
And claim him of their kin : 

The light he never quite hath lost 
Shall fill the spaces wide, 

His soul become the precious cost 
For which the Lamb hath died ! 



Miscellany Poems 



AND OTHER POEMS 



A WORSHIPPER 



M 



Y love kneels high amid the choir, 
I kneeling far below, 
Send up my prayer, my warm desire 
That cannot higher go ; 

Ah, this full well I know. 

The censer swings, the vested priest 
Doth give the peace to all ; 

But she who hath my care increased, 
Forbids my share to fall — 

Alas ! too soon 'twould pall. 

Yet if I raise mine eyes to her, 
High in the pillared space, 

There seems no calmer worshipper, 
Nor such another face, 

So dovelike in its grace. 

Droop her long lashes on a cheek 
That guards its secret well 

As her deep heart, that will not speak, 
Like any babbling shell, 

But throbs unspeakable. 



14 



YOUTH: 

Pale is she, for a ruddy hue 
Would ill denote a soul 

That knows not pause at let or do, 
Since love shall be the goal ; 

That stakes not part, but whole. 

And now they sing: her voice I track 
Throughout the choral maze; 

Each note my conscious soul gives back, 
The while the organ plays, 

And saints do stand agaze. 

Loud in the Kyrie I hear, 
Low in the Miserere, 

Her message meant for mine own'ear, 
Her prayer that meets my prayer 

With answering despair. 

The mass is done, the priest hath blessed 
Each kneeling worshipper; 

And all, with holy joy possessed, 
The peace of Christ aver — 

Save me, with thought of her! 



AND OTHER POEMS 203 



LIFE 



A LITTLE space to shut us in : 
Four walls to rise and guard 
The helpless whom our love doth ward 
From outer sorrow, outer sin. 

A little grief for the fond dream 

That once in sanguine vision led, 
And now is of our precious dead, 

Tho' none shall see its marble gleam. 

A little grace to sweeten strife, 

Whate'er the toil, whate'er the lot; 
And love and duty unforgot . 

To those who live but in our life. 

A little hope (ah, few have more 

Who shall not so themselves deceive) 
A little hope — yet let us cleave — 

That something better lies before. 

A little dust our dust to save, 

Till Nature take us back again 
With chemic sunshine, kindly rain — 

A little dust to make a grave. 



*04 YO UTH: 



RECOMPENSE 



w 



HEN life is at an end : 
Will peace then come 
To hearts that throbbed too much, 
Or else were dumb 

With their great ache and loss? 
Shall these the touch 

Of death at last befriend, 
And lift their cross, 

When life is at an end? 

When life is at an end : 
Shall they who poured 

Their meed of love in vain, 
Find all restored 

By Him, the source of love, 
Who gives again 

Thrice o'er what they did lend; 
Since still they strove 

Till life was at an end? 



AND OTHER POEMS 205 

When life is at an end : 
Shall they who sought, 

In humbleness and awe, 
The holy thought,— 

Shall they be less than he, 
Before the Law, 

Who still to form did bend, 
A Pharisee, — 

When life is at an end? 

When life is at an end — 
Oh, may we leave 

The After then to Him, 
Nor idly grieve 

Because we know no more: — 
Lo ! there lies dim 

The fearsome way — a Friend 
To walk before ! — 

When life is at an end. 



YOUTH: 



ON A PORTRAIT OF MARY STUART 



O 



H, fair fond face, and eyes that do persuade, 
Now thou so long art dust, thy royal cause 

Another heart to gain, another blade: — 
And whoso in thy sweet defendance draws 

The metaphoric sword, shall win the smile 
Of women true, of loyal men the praise: — 

It is not that I think thee free from guile 
(The world's desire is she who still betrays) 

Yet, yet, dear Queen, — lo, here upon his knee, 

Thy latest slave makes pledge of fealty! 

The wild alarms of thy perturbed day, 
The deeds of blood, the foray and the feud, 

The 'scapes and perils which thou didst essay, 
Less than thy boldest warrior subdued ; 

The look thou gavest when thou wouldst requite 
A chance of death accepted for thy sake, 

The sweetness which thou wert to common sight, 
The passions that thou couldst not choose but wake, — 

All, all leap forth in this rare pictured glance, 

And truth is one with thy undreamed romance. 



AND OTHER POEMS 207 

Yet hearts were flint when thy young beauty shone 
Injthat grim land, thine own by hapless fate : 

So shall thy sufferings thy fault atone, 
Thy courage high the latest ill abate. 

Love led thee far and sometimes led thee wrong; 
'Tis ever still his wont with such as thou 

Who mak'st the world to feel thy spell so strong, 
Thine ancient tale appears a thing of now, 

And, as thy regal presence lives and charms, 

Oh, wondrous tale ! — a world is called to arms. 



2o8 YOUTH. 



CREDO CHRISTI 

ET me not join my voice with those 
Who raise the latest cry of doubt, 
Who build a system God without, 

And rank themselves the changeless foes 



L 1 



Of ancient faith and oracle, 
Of Buddha, Vishnu, Moussa, Christ: — 
Holding these four as equal priced 

With them who have the creeds to sell. 

Oh, bitter mock ! — that all the years 
(So witness, system newly schooled) 
Show but an universe befooled 

With barren hopes and futile tears : — 

That saints all vainly offered up 
Their penitential strife and care ; 
That some did life and love forbear, 

And eager drink the martyr's cup : — 



AND OTHER POEMS 209 

That fadeless and undying trust 
Should now be held as fitting food 
An age barbaric to delude; 

And naught essential is but dust. 

And He, the fair-faced, the Divine 
(For live not they who yet believe?) 
Mayhap, He meant not to deceive, 

But men have wronged His simple line; 

And where a dreamer stood confessed, 
Have feigned or madly felt a god — 
That in Judea's mirings trod, 

And died with wretches, breast to breast ! 

What do they give (these gods destroyed) 
To wake the saving fear and hope? 
How draw another horoscope, 

And recreate the Heavens void? 

A germic theory to prove 
How Man, descended of the Ape, 
Thinks his earth-centred lot to 'scape, 

And rise into a higher groove ; 



210 YOUTH: 

And share the secret of the stars, 
Their source dim-sought, their changing plan - 
For Faith that likens God to man 

With ease the Infinite unbars! 

There is no good, the scoffers say, 
Save that which springeth from the sense 
Of human right — nor appetence 

For evil, but the self-same way. 

Wipe clean the myth-enpeopled sky, 
So Reason may discern her track : 
Write in the truer zodiac, 

And let the old confusions die! 

Must this suffice, and naught to boot, 
For Love's immortal heritage? — 
An empty Heaven the Christless wage, 

A Faith disrupted, branch and root. 
-»> 

'Tis sometimes hard to choose between 
The Faith entrenched in formula, 
Compelling vulgar fear and awe, 

As from the first its due hath been ; 



AND OTHER POEMS 211 

And that free thought which will not see 
How God in forms, as works, may live;" 
Which puts a barren negative 

As answer to the mystery. 

For hands of men will ever mar 
The structure by the Godhead laid ; 
And priestship aye become a trade 

To drive the questing spirit far. 

Yet must we take with such alloy 
The Truth that shall this lot redeem ; 
Submitting to the things which seem 

Designed to work our souls annoy. 

For this was part of that same cross 
Which He of Calvary upbore; 
Nor shall we miss the trial sore, 

If all our hope come not to loss. 

The Christ that saved my soul for me — 
(If I do not His truth betra)') 
'Tis not His Godship to gainsay 

That I a hollow worship flee. 



212 YOUTH: 

Nay, rather do I make retreat 
That His fair image bear no flaw, 
And I may better see the law 

Which leads unto the higher seat. 

Deep in my soul He hath abode, 
Since, as a child, the wondrous tale, 
The Love that shall o'er Death prevail, 

The blood redeeming God-bestowed, — 

Did by degrees my sense possess; 
Till, crescive with the forming mind, 
The marvel grew, tho' undefined, 

And growing in its power to bless: — 

Aye, and to curse — should reasoned pride 
Beguile me from the path afar, 
The mystic promise of the Star 

Which rose the seekers' steps to guide. 

Dark is my soul and error-tossed, 
An easy conquest to the foe: 
Yet there is One, full well I know, 

Without whose will I am not lost. 



AND OTHER POEMS 213 

To all men shall a doubt arise 
When seeking, with a finite grasp, 
The Three-Fold Mystery to clasp, 

The Lamb's supernal sacrifice; 

The plot that seemeth to embrace, 
With its divinely planted hope, 
A straitened sum, a narrow scope, 

A fraction of the darkling race : — 

As He who His Begotten gave 
The deathful trespass to atone, 
Should call but part of these His own, 

Nor hold an equal scheme to save. 

But this is idle — worse than vain, 
So to accuse His aim benign: 
So doth a vexing child repine 

That wisheth things forbid to gain. 

Mark how the father, loving much, 
Would keep the harmful guerdon back; 
Albeit his wisdom seem to lack 

The warm response of Nature's touch. 



214 YOUTH: 

E'en so with Him, the primal cause 
Of all obedience, all pursuit 
Of knowledge, whatsoe'er the fruit — 

'Tis He, too, that ordaineth pause ; 

And still withholdeth from our ken 
The story of yon speechless vault ; 
Else might the daring quest cry halt 

Unto each shining citizen ! 

-*> 

Enough that He who rules is good, 
And earnest giveth of His will 
To ransom every soul from ill, 

With grace of the Atoning Rood: — 

And so hath spread His promise wide, 
That all may read the gracious sign ; 
Or, failing some, His love divine 

Shall for the sightless, too, provide. 

Enough that shines the light for me, 
Tho' myriads languish in the dark: — 
Sing high, my soul, and like the lark, 

Above the mists of doubting flee! 



AND OTHER POEMS 215 



THE BISHOP 



THE Bishop is dead — I passed his door, 
And a fluttering crape could tell no more : 
Sombre the mansion whence life is fled, 
And the idle walk near with a careless tread ; 
But some do pause as the deep bells toll, 
To cross themselves, with a "Rest his soul ! " 



A pious care — yet what needs the thought, 
When the Lord's anointed to dust is brought; 
When the shepherd who guided the fearsome sheep 
No longer his vigil of love doth keep; 
When the hands and the lips are cold and dumb 
That ministered oft the viaticum? 



'Tis so ordained that the just shall pray 
For the saint who hath been taken away; 
E'en tho' his estate be past all doubt, 
Yet few have the soul herself found out, 
And a saving thought (that admits no sin) 
May help him his higher crown to win. 



216 YOUTH: 

The house is dark, but, across the street, 
The quiring singers in sadness meet; 
And the mourning many do throng the nave 
Where anew the text of the worm and grave 
Is preached with a feeling that might not be 
Ere the Bishop himself saw the mystery! 

For a solemn something is resting there, 
And the swelling sob of the Miserere 
Hath a meaning that ne'er before it had, 
When the mitred man on his throne was glad : 
And the people are bowed with a stricken sense 
Of the equal hand of Omnipotence. 

Lo ! where he lies in the awful state 
Of a glory that Death may not abate: — 
His vestments rich, with embroidered cross — 
Mayhap, it was heavy, despite the gloss 
And pomp sufficient which here are seen 
In the splendid house of the Nazarene. 

Ah, well! — the moral, the type ne'er mix — 

Let us rather look at the crucifix 

That he holds e'en now to his silent breast, 

As the sign of his hope and the seal of his rest. 

'Twas pressed to his lips when his soul took flight, 

And sainted it seems in the people's sight. 



AND OTHER POEMS 217 

Is it vain indeed to seek for a trace 
Of that first rapture on his calm face, 
When the spirit, escaping its mortal thrall, 
Did its merited joy and peace forestall; 
And the dying sense for a space might seize 
The hymning of Heavenly harmonies? 



Alas! — to a credulous faith may be 

That which its hope o'erleaps to see ; 

But for me there is naught but a mask of clay, 

Which, were 't to endure to the judgment day, 

Should never a hint of the truth betray: 

For Death wipes out with his equal dust 

The fear of the sinner, the saint's high trust! 



Yet bravely he lies, tho' he speaketh naught; 
His crozier beside him, — his vestments wrought 
With a lavish richness which is not sin, 
Since thrift in the temple may not begin: 
And the people view him with self-same awe 
As when living he witnessed the Master's law. 

Oh, a burthen grievous it must have been, 

Tho' the sightless face seem now serene; 

And if there were failings — but stop! — not so: 



15 



218 YOUTH: 

For the Lord He judgeth all men below; 

And the Bishop anointed shall equal stand 

With the sinner who scarce might a hope command. 

Let us leave him there in his cope of gold, 

Ere they fit his frame for the final mould. 

Some grace, mayhap, shall our portion be 

If we ponder with due solemnity, 

How the worm and the dust aye work their will, 

And the highest of earth fall the lowest still ! 

For the Bishop is dead — I passed his door, 
And a fluttering crape could tell no more. 
Dark is the mansion whence life is fled, 
And the idle walk by with a heedless tread : 
But some there be (and we of the roll) 
Who pause as the mourning bells do toll, 
To cross themselves, with a "Rest his soul! " 



AND OTHER POEMS 219 



MY DEBT TO THEE, THOU 
PLEASANT WEED 



MY debt to thee, thou pleasant weed, 
No poet's tribute might exceed. 
The genii of thy curling rope 
Have given me a larger hope, 
And spread the scene where I am pent, 
To Fancy's farthest continent. 

Thine is the spell that equals me 
With bards of widest empery : — 
What tho' a leisure scant is mine, 
A niggard muse, a halting^line, — 
Thou hintest at a golden fame 
That yet shall deck a humble name. 

From Care that sits my shoulder near 
(No household god than he more dear) 
Thou givest me respite — or, at least, 
Soothest as doth the bidden priest, 
With thine own mild philosophy, 
Against the things which aye must be. 



YO UTH: 

When chafing in the cramped lot 
That here is mine (tho* why, God wot) 
And vainly dreaming of a chance, 
Yet all unhoped, deliverance, — 
Thou helpest me to think it true, — 
And eke to deem the fools are two. 

'Tis thus for every passing ill 
Thou hast a balm efficient still ; 
The kindest friend man ever had, 
Thou changest life's jeremiad 
Unto a pleasant song and glad ; 
And smoothest o'er the rugged ways 
With thy true note of honest praise. 

Nor shall I pause (tho' near the strife 
To much prefer thee to a wife ; 
For tho' her sweetness hath no end, 
And all the virtues in her blend, 
Yet some day will she find a tongue 
As keen as ever barbed or stung. 

Therefore it is, oh, kindly weed, 
No rhymed glozing can exceed 
The debt thou hast imposed on me 
With thine own sweet philosophy; 
Making the best (in homely phrase) 
Of the long count of common days. 



AND OTHER POEMS 221 

Believe me, while a care's to gain, 
No cross shall come betwixt us twain ; 
And when the final hour is near, 
Thou shalt not then be held less dear; 
But I may give my latest breath 
In grateful love to thee — and Death. 



Hi YOUTH: 



A FRAGMENT 



SHALL I confess? — In my short span of life, 
Much have I missed that Wisdom aye would 
teach : 
Truant I proved, as to a scolding wife, 
And sought the shrine where Folly still doth preach 

Her homilies beguiling: — so, of saws 
And proverbs ripe, wherewith to meet the brunt 

Of fortune's hap, gleaned I but scanty store; 
While, bent to pluck the ribbon in the front 

Of my gay mistress, laughed I at all laws 
That might have stayed my wildly careless score. 



A loser? — Yes, but haply not beyond 
The saving grace that sad fruition brings : 

My faith doth hold, th' Chastener still is fond, 
Soothing away, as 'twere, the penal stings 

Of his untoward children — as a sire, 
Grieving and tender, yet with rigor just, 

Spares not the rod, e'en while his looks inspire 
A hope that plucks the sinner from the dust. 



AND OTHER POEMS 223 

No plot so old as this in all the scheme 
Of our strange world: methinks the fashion came 

Coeval with the figleaf and the theme 
Of Adam's love and sorrow, sin and shame. 

And we of his sad portion still must take — 
Eating the fruit that drew the primal curse, 

Drinking vain draughts a quenchless thirst to 

slake — 

And ever the trite tragedy rehearse. 

* * * 



But, tho' our Edens vanish and the doom 

Press hard on us, the latest of the seed, 

Till, in our puny daring, we assume 

To break the bond and other signals read 

Save those set in the charter of our fate — 
(All-impotent to change our fixed estate) 
Still, still the gods grind out their stated store, 
And aye the tale is neither less nor more. 



To sin and sorrow, to give scope to joy 
O'erleaping license in the heady rush 
Of early spirits, and the fevered flush 

Of hope untried, seeking a fond employ: — 
To play with passion in our lavish prime, 

And, moth-like, burning in the grosser flame 



224 YOUTH: 

Of earthly love or lust — as men may name 
The madness of the moment — 'tis the same, 
And still hath been, from all undated time: — 

This makes the sum for many — nay, for most, 

Tho' Virtue still will have her specious boast; 

For men will swear they love her overmuch, 

When, at the spell of Time's ungentle touch, 

They bid the rosy follies all adieu, 

And smugly their old innocence renew; — 

At least, cast off the lure which still hath held 

The strongest that the race have ever quelled : 

Aye, and the wisest — Paphos draws no line 

'Twixt Antony and David the divine, 

Or e'en his wiser son, who preaches still 

'Gainst avid senses and a lawless will ; 

Yet could not his own royal calm preserve 

When Sheba tickled his erotic nerve. 
* * * 

Let kindness reign : sure He that came to save 
Taught naught so much as this, and shall not we 

A little hearken to the words He gave, 
Like some that heard and blessed in Galilee? 

Something we pardon still to that fond clay 
Which overseeks the mandate to obey; 

Adding to the divine a human touch 



AND OTHER POEMS 225 

That all too grossly mingles with love's own : 

Yet he whose trespass lies in loving much, 
Stands not in Love's first, darling world alone. 

Did not Love bring to us the master-key 
Of what were else but deathful mystery? 
Was He not before Chaos and Old Night, 
A demiurge ere Eden's new delight, 

When the young stars first raised their choral shout 
Of praise unto the Planner of the spheres? — 
And down the many cycles — thro' all tears 

And bitterness — till faith be one with doubt, 
The promise of his rainbow smile appears. 



226 YOUTH 



THE BIRTHDAY 

WAS born upon a day 
That I keep with grief alway. 
Of these days a barren score, 
Three, besides a lustrum more, 
Have I counted, while the span, 

Like a spendthrift, hath outrun 
Every grace that falls to man — 

And I wish the tale were done ! 



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